Emerging technologies underpin the innovative services and products that can make the difference between the success and failure of a business. These technologies are essential to keep pace with the accelerating changes currently exerting their influence on most industries around the world. Investing in the infrastructure needed to develop such solutions should be on the shortlist of organizations aiming to stay afloat.
Embracing New Opportunities Brought by AI and Cloud Technologies
Regardless of size and industry, every organization needs to embrace the opportunities brought about by artificial intelligence (AI) and the cloud, and put in place strategies that focus on the benefits that such technologies bring to their operations. Artificial intelligence and cloud technologies can leave their mark on every aspect of an organization, whether it be manufacturing, HR operations, marketing, sales, or logistics.
The new Worldwide Artificial Intelligence Spending Guide from International Data Corporation (IDC) expects global spending on AI systems to jump from $85.3 billion in 2021 to more than $204 billion in 2025. The compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for the 2021–2025 period will be 24.5%.
As businesses pivot to a digital-first economy, the cloud will continue to play an ever greater and more dominant role as the IT industry focuses on delivering greater efficiency, flexibility, and faster innovation.
Given its central role in future enterprises, International Data Corporation (IDC) also forecasts “whole cloud” spending will surpass $1.3 trillion by 2025 while sustaining a CAGR of 16.9%. This encompasses worldwide spending on cloud services, the hardware and software components underpinning the cloud supply chain, and the professional/managed services opportunities around cloud services.
How Emerging Technologies Help Businesses Stay Afloat
Cost efficiencies, managing, processing and securing data, and automating operations are processes emerging technologies such as AI, Internet of Things (IoT), the cloud, or 5G can run successfully. In a period of uncertainty, like the one most industries are going through during the pandemic, cost efficiency must be one of the main concerns of every organization.
From eliminating repetitive tasks through RPA (robotic process automation) to Chatbot solutions designed for the customer service department, emerging technologies make your business more agile, with employees focusing on value-adding tasks instead of repetitive ones.
Moreover, businesses have experienced the drive to find ways to use the cloud as an operating model to enable easy management, scaling and sharing of computing, storage, networking, and data protection. The sudden need for rapid digital transformation has increased the demand for hybrid (private and public) cloud models.
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, too many organizations made decisions about workload transitions to the cloud without an extended plan or a broader vision. One-off solutions have been found to software and individual problems, but such investments do not result in the best overall, long-term solution. However, having consistent cloud operations and infrastructure is essential, so organizations are quickly finding that hybrid cloud models are the best way forward when it comes to cost, scalability, and sustained security.
Hybrid Cloud Solutions and Well-Developed Infrastructure
In general, the public cloud is a one-size-fits-all solution that does not meet the needs of all workloads. While organizations have moved quickly—and often implemented multiple cloud solutions—they are now struggling. The complexity of managing many data security and privacy requirements can become costly.
Therefore, a move to the public cloud is only advantageous for those workloads that benefit most from this type of technology. This approach is pushing many organizations toward hybrid solutions, or the best possible combination of public and private cloud and data centers. Above all, the strengths of a hybrid cloud are its flexibility and openness, allowing for changes when a new direction is needed. With a hybrid cloud solution, data applications, services, and large workloads can be managed and moved across public and private clouds using the same infrastructure and operating environment.
Once the strategy outlining the implementation of emerging technologies is in place, the next step is to map out the infrastructure required to support these processes.
Choosing the right infrastructure provider can make the difference between a successful implementation and a poor one. Companies should always look for products that can run applications based on emerging technologies, whether it is artificial intelligence, cloud platforms, 5G, or Internet of Things.
AI-based solutions help companies modernize their IT infrastructure and leverage the capabilities of evolving technologies to streamline their operations. Hybrid cloud-based options enable more streamlined workload management, greater data protection, and improved cost efficiencies. Ensuring your organization stays relevant in the AI and cloud era means adopting technologies that aim to drive operational efficiencies, transform decision-making, and generate new opportunities that will help grow your business.
