Dimension Data, the $6.7 billion global ICT solutions and services provider, has released its IT predications for the next 12 months. According to Ettienne Reinecke, Dimension Data’s Group Chief Technology Officer (CTO), conversations that Dimension Data’s teams are having with organizations revolve around four themes: data at the core of the digital transformation, hybrid cloud as mechanism for agility, workspaces for tomorrow, and cyber security.
According to Dimension Data’s Group Chief Technology Officer, social, mobile, cloud, analytics, Internet-of-Things (IoT), and bimodal IT are all hot topics in the IT industry. But, he says, where do organizations prioritize their budgets and resources?
“All of these trends and technologies serve a larger purpose, because they enable the transformation of an organization to become a digital enterprise,” said Etienne Reinecke. “In other words, the business uses IT to respond faster to market opportunities and threats, and prioritizes the experience of the people it works with, whether they’re customers, employees, or business partners.”
- Digital Infrastructure – It’s all about understanding your data … and how to exploit it
The role of data has fundamentally changed. For many years, data center professionals would concentrate much of their time and energy on things like storage drives and backups, and how best to perform tasks such as replication and de-duplication. Then, the primary focus was reducing the cost of managing data. Now, that’s all changed. Today it’s all about honing your ability to exploit data and finding ways to turn it into business value.
- Hybrid Cloud – Private cloud adoption will increase in 2016
The next twelve months will see an increase in private cloud adoption, as savvy IT decision-makers with a ‘cloud first’ strategy move to adopt new managed private cloud offerings with consumption-based commercial models.
- Workspaces for Tomorrow – Work behaviors will be shaped more radically by social media in 2016
Much of social collaboration is enabled by consumer-focused tools. Technologies such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Foursquare, and many others have given rise to robust and business-oriented counterparts that offer audio, video, file-sharing, and workflow integration. These include applications such as Cisco’s ‘team-rooming’ solution Spark, Microsoft’s Yammer and Skype for Business, Viber, WhatsApp, Slack, and many others.
These technologies encourage the creation of communities; living, working, shopping, and interacting ‘out loud’; sharing ideas; easily finding people and information; collaboration; and faster decision-making. These behaviors will make their way into more and more organizations in 2016, allowing end users to work together seamlessly from different geographies, and at different times of the day.
- Cyber Security – High profile security breaches are set to continue in 2016, and more executives will become the targets of hackers
The slew of high-profile security breaches that took place in 2015 are set to continue in 2016. And the disturbing new trend of ‘whaling’ will see hackers target senior executives with ransomware, demanding money or using their information fraudulently. In addition, forensics will play a major role in the cyber security space in the next 12 months.
