Mobility, Cloud Top Tech Trends For Solution Providers To Watch
cloud solution provider Bluewolf
In its 2011-2012 Technology Outlook, Bluewolf identified mobility, cloud computing, user engagement, big data and the consumerization of IT as the top five technology trends solution providers will see going into next year.
According to Bluewolf, mobility saw swift year-over-year growth fueled by HTML5, the apple iPhone and iPad and Google Android. Bluewolf said that "mobile as a distribution system is remaking entire industries" and the media industry is leading the mobile charge, with HTML5 use in media growing by 1,200 percent year-over-year. Meanwhile, Bluewolf pointed out, other industries have just started experimenting with mobility. The report also revealed that HTML5, Android development and iPhone and iPad use increased by more than 200 percent year-over-year while BlackBerry and Windows Mobile use dropped by more than 50 percent.
"Businesses are under pressure to adopt mobile technologies and to be more collaborative in order to reach their customers and employees, while dealing with the challenges and implications of adopting these tools in the workplace," Bluewolf co-founder Michael Kirven wrote in the report.
Another major technology trend that is defining the industry is cloud computing. According to Bluewolf, businesses are moving applications to the cloud and the big players are being dominated by up-and-comers like Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Apps, along with established players like Salesforce.com. Bluewolf found that use of cloud solutions like Eloquoa, Marketo, Salesforce and Google Apps was up more than 100 percent, while AWS usage was up more than 50 percent.
"Look seriously at what you can move to the cloud now (processes, applications or infrastructure), otherwise you will be the last in your industry to do so," Tom Gooding, Bluewolf account director wrote in the report.
On the user engagement side, companies are increasingly seeing the ability of user experience to aid in user adoption and success of internal and external facing technology projects.
"New IT systems are being designed with user engagement as a core value," Bluewolf noted, adding that development frameworks like HTML5, .NET and Java are allowing user experience system to be applied more broadly to back-end legacy systems and mobile applications.
At the same time, the demand for big data technologies continues to increase. With innovation in the data management, storage and visualization, IT is breaking deep into data and providing new insight into businesses. The demand for big data technologies covers everything from data storage, warehousing and integration, to business intelligence.
"Where there were once silos in the data, we are no seeing a new stream of insights," Bluewolf said.
And, lastly, the consumerization if IT is taking over. According to Bluewolf, recent technology innovations have been consumer-driven and IT pros are using both personal devices to boost their productivity, but they expect their workplaces to reflect the technology innovations, too.
"'Many-to-many' interaction is becoming the norm," Bluewolf wrote. "Along with mobile technologies, demand for enterprise technologies like SharePoint and SAP is increasing as they integrate consumer driven innovation and collaboration tools into their offerings."