Among the main ICT trends and drivers for this year, Gartner identifies cloud computing, social technologies and mobile. Gartner further says that for industry CIOs “navigating economic and market volatility will be a critical success factor in 2012 and beyond”.
Also “aligning their IT and business practices with the needs of customers and business partners”, will be critical for ICT and business success, Gartner claims.
In a report, the company emphasizes and explains these trends and evolutions while summing up several top vertical industry technology predictions and trends for the next 4-5 years. An overview.
Always connected – also while literally on the road
The always-connected digital lifestyle, social media, cloud computing will remain important change agents in the coming years. Furthermore, the need for users to be able to access the same data from multiple devices will remain high. The use of a cloud allows users to access data from multiple devices that they own and work with or present the data. This saves them from the inconvenience of having to transfer data from device to device and will remain a need for business and personal users.
Gartner further predicts that within five years remote computing will have a significant role in automobile choices for consumers. The company predicts that the majority of shoppers in technically advanced countries will be seeking vehicles that have Internet access for web browsing within the car itself. Full Internet access capabilities within the vehicle will be mainstream with screens being used for finding hotels, researching new towns and keeping in touch with relatives or business contacts as examples.
IT management and the need to be agile
With the focus on technology and IT departments, the strong will succeed and the weak will struggle. According to Gartner, up to 50% of the companies in the marketplace today may fail over the next four years due to ineffective IT management. This means that companies must continue to improve their IT management and continue the education of their IT professionals to compete in the marketplace. Or as Gartner says: “Being agile and adopting new business practices will be imperative for survival in 2012”.
More vertical industry technology predictions for the next five years:
- By 2015, new, external social Web and cloud-based services will generate 25 percent of consumer-driven banking products and services.
- By 2015, context-aware promotions will comprise 10 percent of convenience item promotional activity among consumer goods manufacturers in developed markets.
- By 2016, more than 5 percent of searches will be integrated using mobile devices’ video/audio sensors instead of typed or spoken phrases.
- Through 2015, 80 percent of multichannel implementations will fail because retailers will retain channel- and product-centric strategies.
- By 2015, 30 percent of smart grid projects will leverage cloud services to address big data from converging technologies.
Discover all predictions here and tell us what you think here or in the BT Let’s Talk LinkedIn Group.
