By just about every aspect, technology has been and continues to shape the world in ever more appealing and sometimes unsettling ways. With the foundation of mobility, cloud, connectivity laid, and data, the year ahead is expected to witness evolutionary progress on numerous fronts. Digital business transformation continues to be a key driving force for Small Medium Businesses (SMEs) and large enterprises alike.
Ameri describes the evolution of IT in three different stages including the mainframe era, the Internet era, and the cloud or mobile era. Moving forward, software-defined components will result in hyper-converged infrastructure, novel elements built from a cloud mindset are expected to play larger roles, Blockchain is anticipated to redefine the database architecture, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) will provide an innovative layer for technology interaction.
Technology firms are persistently on the leading-edge, considering innovative and unconventional ways to meet the evolving demands of the savvy customer. Exponential technologies such as 3-D printing, virtual and augmented reality, robotics, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are opening up significant avenues for market growth. In addition, cognitive technologies such as pattern and speech recognition, machine learning, and natural language processing are being implanted in software applications, imbuing big data with superior capabilities.
Further, Blockchain in particular, the foundation for the digital currency ‘Bitcoin,’ has huge allegations not only for the banking and financial services industry but for any organization that handles a large amount of transaction data. The promising world of information technology is one in which the data is the emperor, social platforms develop as a new source of Business Intelligence (BI), and cloud computing delivers on IT’s role as a driving factor for business growth.
Thanks to brands such as Uber, people are evolving to having everything on demand using phone apps. The future is likely to showcase new approaches and technologies that governments and high performing businesses can adopt to prepare for the modern world of computing.