Industry leaders weigh-in on trends in enterprise IT.
As the internet of things continues to grow, producing massive amounts of potentially cost-saving data, enterprise decision makers are faced with numerous roadmaps – and many pitfalls – as they undertake the buzzy process of digital transformation.
In many ways big data and the ability to analyze it in a way that produces actionable, real-time insight, is the oil that keeps the big business machine running. But consider the amount of data a large enterprise like a telecom carrier, internet service provider, bank or product manufacturer produces: How do you keep up?
First, you’ll need a cloud-based infrastructure that taps into massive computing power to collect, store and manage data. Commscope’s Ed Solis, director of building market development and enterprise strategy, wrote in a recent blog that cloud migration would continue to pick up in 2017.
“A recent IDC survey indicates that currently 41% of a company’s IT budget is allocated to cloud versus outsourcing or in-house. The survey indicates that in 24 months, that will increase to 47%,” Solis wrote. “We believe there also will be a build out of private clouds for those industries that have regulatory requirements or their legacy networks do not allow them to go to a full public cloud at this time.”
The move to cloud – whether public, private or hybrid – comes with numerous benefits and new challenges, including security, according to Jason Liu, a Cisco product marketing manager in the Enterprise Product Solutions and Marketing team.
“As organizations look to the cloud to enable their business with benefits like flexibility, simplicity and scale, cloud security adoption will follow closely behind,” Lui wrote in a Cisco blog post. “This year [2017], expect to see increasing interest in protecting data and applications in the cloud. Cloud-delivered and cloud-administered security solutions are gaining in popularity also. These solutions offer ease and speed of deployment and consistent, simple administration to provide an initial layer of defense.”
As businesses undertake the process of standing up new infrastructure intended to perform very specific, granular automated data management processes, there could be a shift away from out-the-rack solutions to more bespoke product and service offerings.
Greg McStravick, president of data and database management at SAP, told CIO: “Big data is not a new trend, but the rate at which it’s being harnessed – and where it’s being warehoused – is going to have a ripple effect in the market. Organizations will work to accommodate big-scale engineering projects, earmarking investment dollars into areas like the internet of things, which is driving scores of machine-to-machine data. Because of this, the era of the grand infrastructure solution may very well be behind us, and the focus on unique solutions tailored by the enterprise will come sharply into focus.”
Underpinning this exciting new era of digital transformation is connectivity, which Solis pointed out is becoming increasingly complex. Solis gave the example of modern enterprise buildings, which now require much more than traditional voice and data services.
“What was traditionally just hardwired for data and voice is now being retrofitted or designed new with wireless in mind,” Solis wrote. “Building owners and operators are looking at the co-existence of wireless and wireline for the coming year but will consider the new radio spectrum, both licensed and unlicensed, that is coming available as well as new technologies that enable the universal ceiling. As this convergence happens, we see a greater focus in 2017 on consolidation and partnerships (creating an ecosystem) to address these needs.”
This comment is in step with something Chris Wixom, Corning’s senior director and VP of sales and business development, told RCR Wireless News in a recent interview. Giving the example of a traditional distributed antenna system deployment, Wixom said, “If we’re still building DAS, we’re missing the point. Why is that? With Wi-Fi, with cellular, with other technologies, customers are increasingly concerned about connectivity. You’ve got a lot of efforts with the carriers to drive [heterogeneous networks] and drive convergence, but it’s really more of a converged build that’s going on.”
