What is the Difference Between Digitalisation and Digitisation

The main difference between digitalisation and digitisation is that digitisation involves transforming information from a physical format into digital format while digitalisation involves applying digitization to expand business processes.

Information Technology (IT) refers to using computing devices to store, obtain, transmit and manage information in business or enterprise level. The rapid development of IT has increased the quality of the lifestyle of each individual. Two popular terms in modern IT world are Digitisation and Digitalisation. Digitalisation means to convert the information from its usual physical form into digital form. On the other hand, Digitalisation means to use Digitisation to enhance business processes, increase profits and produce new opportunities.

Key Areas Covered

1. What is Digitisation
     – Definition, Functionality
2. What is Digitalisation
     – Definition, Functionality
3. What is the Difference Between Digitalisation and Digitisation
     – Comparison of Key Differences

Key Terms

Digitalisation, Digitisation

What is Digitisation

Digitisation involves converting information in the physical format to digital form. With digitisation, it is possible to convert a handwritten article into a digital copy. The common use of it is in both business environments as well as in daily life. In a medical center, it is possible to store all the information of the patients in computing devices, instead of keeping them in files. Moreover, banks send bank statements to an app. These are few examples of digitisation.

What is Digitalisation

Digitalisation describes how digitisation improves business processes. It affects businesses as well as society. For example, there are multinational organizations that have branches in several locations of the world. It is expensive and difficult to conduct meetings as the employees and managers are in different locations. However, video conferencing helps to avoid this situation. It allows holding meetings from their original locations, and everybody can talk virtually. Moreover, it creates a great platform to communicate efficiently and effectively.

Moreover, assume an e-commerce web site. The customer does not need to visit the store. Instead, he can select the items, purchase them and perform transactions online.

Difference Between Digitalisation and Digitisation

Definition

Digitalisation is the process of improving digitization to expand business processes while digitisation is the process of transforming information from a physical format into digital format. Thus, this is the main difference between digitalisation and digitisation.

Dependency

Besides, digitalisation depends on digitisation.

Usage

Digitalization helps to improve business processes and to increase revenues. Meanwhile, digitaization helps to convert the analog information or the information in physical form to digital form. Hence, this is another difference between digitalisation and digitisation.

Examples

Self-service checkouts instead of working a cashier, and using e-commerce websites for shopping are some examples for digitalization whereas converting an image to a digital format, and storing student records in an education institute on a computerized system are some examples for digitisation.

Conclusion

Digitisation and digitalisation are two major terms in the IT industry. The main difference between digitalisation and digitisation is that digitalisation involves applying digitization to expand business processes while digitisation involves transforming information from a physical format into digital format. In brief, digitisation is the basis to digitalisation.

Reference:

1. “Information Technology.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 17 Dec. 2018, Available here.
2. “What Is Digitization? – Definition from WhatIs.com.” WhatIs.com, Available here.

Image Courtesy:

1. “Information-Technology” By Kuldeeps2105 – Own work (CC BY-SA 4.0) via Commons Wikimedia