Continuing from our previous post, Top Strategic Technology Trends – Part One, Part Two enables you, as IT professionals and organizations to capitalize on the knowledge you have already gained from Part One of Gartner’s research. As a “clutch” professional, one does not begin what they are not willing to finish. The last 5 Strategic Technology Trends complement the findings of the first five.
Autonomous Agents and Things
What: Advanced machine learning provides the means for smart machine applications such as robots, autonomous vehicles, virtual personal assistants (VPAs) and smart advisors to behave in a semi-autonomous or fully autonomous mode.
Expectations: Smart Machine Applications, specifically VPA’s such as Apple’s Siri and Microsoft’s Cortana, will be are the predecessors of autonomous agents. The smarter and further developed agents will be accessible through applications or across integrated application platforms. Autonomous things and agents are expected to free up more time to complete the work that only humans can perform.
Challenges: Smart agents and things are currently disrupting many industries—automotive and e-commerce—and are predicted to evolve and expand in their capabilities for at least the next 20 years. IT leaders and companies will be forced to expand their research and development with the uses of this technology in order to compete as an incumbent or emerging company.
Adaptive Security Architecture
What: The rise of new applications requires IT professionals to create heighten security architecture that is adaptive to the new uses and implementations of advanced technology. The adaptive security architecture will include application self-protection, as well as, user and entity behavior analytics.
Expectations: User and entity behavior analytics are expected to assess the activity between users and various entities such as peer groups and applications. Using advanced machine learning and statistical models, analysts will be able to identify the correlation between users and various entities’ activities and behaviors, and recognize irregular behaviors and patterns.
Challenges: Previously used security architecture such as perimeter defense and rule-based security lack the means to protect organizations against the new vulnerabilities. The implication of the advent of digital business and the algorithmic economy is the need to devise an unprecedented form of security architecture. Additionally, the “hacker industry” is growing exponentially which forces IT professionals to quickly formulate security measures that can protect their organizations and be adaptable for the upcoming technology innovations and shifts.
Advanced System Architecture
What: Advanced System Architecture like neuromorphic architecture enable technology to behave in a similar fashion as the human brain, specifically it can learn; observe patterns; and make predictions. High energy efficient field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), which outperforms graphic processing units (GPUs), drives the advanced system architecture allowing it to run at speeds higher than a teraflop.
Expectations: FPGA- based architecture is expected to bolster the learning capabilities of advanced machines to be multiplied into the smallest Internet of Things endpoints like homes, cars, watches and human beings.
Challenges: FPGAs require months to be built for specific projects and are often determined non-reusable if not used for the same advanced system architecture or specific project.
Mesh App and Service Architecture
What: The mesh app and service architecture is the flexible platform that cumulates information sources, devices, apps, services, and micro-services across multiple endpoint devices and can work together to generate a continuous digital experience.
Expectations: IT organizations are expected to increase delivery services as cloud services within this malleable architecture that is sustained by software-defined application and architectures.
Challenges: IT professionals and organizations lack devo-operations perspectives to assist in the continuous development, integration, and delivery of these services.
Internet of Things Architecture and Platforms
What: Behind the mesh app and service architecture is the Internet of Things platform. The technologies within the IoT platform structure the groundwork of competencies for communicating and securing endpoints in the IoT.
Expectations: IT companies such as IBM and Microsoft are expected to provide IoT platform components in the future.
Challenges: The inability to standardize IoT platform architectures will cause IT leaders to constantly create their own IoT platform architectures and integration will be a continuous challenge.
We hope these insights will enable you as IT professionals and organizations to be both, proactive and reactive, to trends within the industry. Ultimately, we expect to see more IT companies become powerful disruptors in the industry.
A full review of Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2016 can be found at: Gartner’s Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends