Dramatic shift taking place in enterprise technology space
The enterprise technology space is undergoing significant changes, and certain trends are set to impact businesses around the world, according to Fujitsu, the multinational information technology equipment and services company.
Fujitsu predicts enterprise and personal applications and information will blend into one affecting mobility, security and data storage in the workplace.
According to the company, in the lead up to 2025 millennials will increasingly demand a virtual workspace and insist on an arrangement that suits their needs.
On top of this, cyber-criminals will become more sophisticated and focus more of their criminal activities on creating data relevancy using data analytics.
Neil Jarvis, Fujitsu chief information officer, says, "In today's technology-focused culture, an unprecedented amount of our daily lives is now digitised.
"By 2025, enterprise technology will necessarily become more human centric than it is today.
"This shift, which is due to an increasingly innovative society that demands a ubiquitously people-friendly user experience in the workplace, will blur the lines between the enterprise and life itself," Jarvis says.
Increased demand for a virtual workforce
According to the Freelancers Union, there are 53 million people doing freelance work in the US along, which is 34% of the national workforce.
This number could expand to as much as 89% since millennials report a strong preference for choosing when and where they work in lieu of being placed in a 9-to-5 position.
As technology advances to the extent that employees can be as productive working remotely as they are at the office (maybe even more so), many organisations will no longer need a traditional office setting in five to ten years, according to Fujitsu.
Even today, it is not uncommon for companies to allow their employees to work from home or remotely on a consistent basis, as all that is typically required of today's worker is a laptop, Wi-Fi connection and mobile phone, the company says.
Furthermore, despite those who oppose virtual workplace arrangements on the grounds of it inhibiting collaboration, engagement and innovation, today's ever-connected employees now demand the level of enterprise connectivity that they enjoy outside of work, so tools like telepresence, unified communications platforms, and enterprise social media tools are a must and will change the role of the IT department significantly, according to Fujitsu.
Cyber crime focused on data analytics
By now, it goes without saying: the Internet of Things (IoT) is introducing new cybersecurity challenges for IT, and it is changing the way we work, says Fujitsu.
Gartner estimates that 4.9 billion connected things are in use in 2015, up 30% from 2014, and will reach 25 billion by 2020.
This exponential increase in the volume of data means that networks will be more vulnerable to information breaches. However, this doesn't necessarily mean that these breaches will lead to increased fraud as making sense of all that data still has a long way to go, according to Fujitsu.
"Most security breaches do not target personal information with the intention of identity theft, and often, they are carried out just to prove it can be done.
"Having said that, just as our interconnected existence expands, so will cyber-criminals' knowledge of data analytics, raising a very important question: Are CIOs prepared to outsmart cyber-criminals as they amp up their expertise?
"With the unsteady success rates of applying cybersecurity practices in our professional and personal lives, it's safe to say there is still a lot of work that needs to be done in this area," says Jarvis.
Enterprise and personal applications and data will merge
By 2016, Gartner predicts that 30% of BYOD strategies will leverage personal applications and data for enterprise purposes, indicating that the line between personal and enterprise usage of applications, data and devices is fading.
The newest members of the workforce are technologically savvy, adaptable and innovative, and they will continue to demand improvements in the way enterprise technology is delivered and stored, to ultimately allow them to work more productively from anywhere and at any time, with faster, more efficient technology, says Fujitsu.
The company predicts that in 10 years much of enterprise technology will become more consumer-driven, where BYOD will stand for 'bring your own data center' in lieu of its current definition, 'bring your own device'.
Changes like the new BYOD will have far-reaching effects on mobility, security and data storage in the workplace, according to Fujitisu.
"We're seeing this already, but working remotely will be just as effective as working from the office, since employees will have all the corporate information they need in their dedicated cloud," says Nick Magliato, Fujitsu head of managed infrastructure services.
"The new BYOD, enabled by cloud, will allow consumers and businesses to leverage the same information, applications and tools, facilitating the user experience, increasing productivity and, perhaps most important, meeting the high expectations of today's users," he says.
