THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

Carlsberg Group VP for Global Business Services told .NEXT Copenhagen how tech is refreshing the famed beer maker.

Carlsberg is probably one of the best-known beer brands in the world. As the third largest brewing business in the world, Carlsberg is also responsible for a bar full of well-known lagers, such as Afsana, Kronenbourg, Shed Head, Brooklyn American Ale, and Switzerland’s Cardinal -- to name just a few. 

Jawaz Illavia, VP Commercial, Digital & Data within Global Business Services at Carlsberg was an independent keynote speaker at the .NEXT conference in Copenhagen, Denmark and told CXO peers how the Danish brewing organization is brewing a new business technology operating model.

"We are driven by our founders' mentality to always pursue perfection and create a better tomorrow for all of us. There is a strong sense of purpose in the organization."

Digital Destination

“You have to find your own path. Every company is different and has its own cultural blueprint. What worked for P&G or Heineken may not work here. I get really riled when people say, ‘lets do what the others are doing,’” he told delegates with passion.

“Being behind is an advantage,” Illavia boldly told peers who had also been challenged by academics, analysts, and innovation leaders from the UK’s NHS, retailer Boots Walgreens, and Denmark’s toy giant, Lego. “To follow the same trajectory of others who started 10 years ago would have been a travesty, so we need to use a Digital 4.0 mindset to fix the 1.0 problems. We also wanted to create the future in a new, fresh way that both challenges the norm, but also works in the Carlsberg culture,” he said. Illavia immediately identified eight areas that needed focus, one of which was the data opportunity. 

Carlsberg Skills

“In the 80s and 90s, corporate IT functions were all about infrastructure. In the 2000s, it was business processes, and then you outsourced the technology, and then the technology companies came along and they have disrupted sectors, and they did that because they had the technology skills in-house,” Illavia challenged his peers. He went on to describe how Carlsberg is building up internal IT capabilities.  

“The core internal team is the glue between all of our partners, whether they are large consultancies or small start-ups,” Illavia told peers. “You cannot predict the future, but you can develop the capabilities to be able to react and ultimately disrupt the industry. We are creating the capabilities that we will need.”