CA Technologies released its top five IT predictions for 2013:
1. Big Data Grows Up
There will be an emergence of Big Data Administrators, who will play a critical role in using new technologies and processing power to take a cold, hard (and useful) look at data and its business application.
In 2013, Big Data projects will begin to show demonstrable ROI. As with Cloud, our definitions will mature, enabling better focus on delivering business value. This infrastructure that integrates with data from social media and open data sources will dramatically increase the demand for management and security. The risk of Big Data decision is much lower and the insights Big Data provides will increase IT’s leadership on innovation.
2. Enterprises Adopt Public Cloud
Enterprises will adopt public Cloud services, spurred by the expansion of offerings from Service Providers (SP) like established telcos, who have already earned their trust.
In addition, as SPs franchise their business models and technologies, cloud services will surge outside the US.
Additionally, the buzz of “The Cloud” will dim as people realize it’s just the way business is done. Vertical industries such as healthcare will lead this trend, realizing its impact on security, the value of specialized community Cloud services and the ability to address compliance while driving down costs. Mainframe will move more rapidly to the cloud as companies that already have a mainframe will adopt cloud technologies and processes to get the most out of them. Externally hosted private Cloud adoption will also increase in the next couple of years.
3. Identity is the New Perimeter
Enterprise users know no bounds of time and space. As they adopt Cloud services and collaborate globally with external customers and partners from multiple devices, they erase the traditional IT perimeter. Security professionals today find themselves in a borderless war on multiple fronts and one common ally – Identity.
Strongly authenticated identity is the new perimeter. This places emphasis on reducing risk at the authentication point, signaling the end of the password as we know it today. As such, we expect to see advanced authentication models expand. We will see more risk-based authentication coming into play based on the device, transaction, location and more. We will see industry move towards more intelligent methods of authentication such as pattern creation, image recognition, mobile phone-based authentication, audio and biometrics. But this is not enough. We will see more content-driven security based on what the data is, or how it’s classified, and that information, plus user identity and role, will be used to guide access rights.
4. The Seventh Sense
There will be increased exploitation of sensing technologies available in most modern mobile devices as the ‘Internet of Things’ takes hold. Everything will become intelligent as sensors are embedded into a wide array of devices from the home to those that drive applications that span disaster management, healthcare IT, transportation networks, Smart Grids, utility computing and more. These technologies will drive additional demand for IT to manage, store, analyze and secure the data traffic, privacy and end points.
5. Mobile/Social First in the Enterprise
Companies will start to build applications not just with mobile/social platforms in mind, but primarily for mobile/social platforms, with traditional platforms secondary or not supported at all. Consumerization will accelerate as we see the end of resistance from the enterprise embracing the rich, immersive user experience consumers are used to from mobile applications.
In parallel, the management of mobile/social IT will become less about managing and securing the devices themselves, and more about managing and securing the mobile applications and mobile data, all while preserving the user experience.
Runner Up - The Rise of DevOps is Imminent
Intelligent computing in every piece of equipment in the world today is driving the world towards environments that are becoming so complex that operations needs to be taken into consideration before the first line of code is written. As the move to agile brings developers, testers, and business closer together, we see DevOps driving the rise of experience-led design. The CIO will be less worried about managing devices and more concerned with managing apps. As services are moved to the Cloud, consumers will be less interested in monitoring infrastructure themselves. DevOps will necessitate the reconstitution of traditional frameworks like ITIL, extracting their most valuable concepts and adjusting them for modern, agile development. In this reality, cloud, mobility, and DevOps are becoming one movement.
The proliferation of smart mobile devices and BYOD, Cloud computing, Big Data and security have brought a new level of complexity. Historically, technology was transactional and IT defined. However, in this networked world, technology is evolving beyond simply enabling operations to being a truly intelligent driver of business innovation.
More than ever before, IT is so well primed to begin its transition from technology ownership and management to becoming the broker of business services. As SaaS, PaaS and IaaS provide turnkey, infrastructure-less access to compute capacity, IT will increasingly focus on composite business applications—rather than the buy-build-manage model—to achieve new levels of speed, innovation, performance and cost/risk efficiencies.
Jason Meserve is Sr. Product Marketing Manager at CA Technologies.
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