Intelligent CIO Middle East Issue 37 | Page 44

FEATURE: CIO PRIORITIES ////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////// A new year will soon be upon us but what new tech trends should CIOs expect to see in the next 12 months? We speak to industry experts from Dimension Data, Opengear and Fortinet who make their predictions. D imension Data has launched its Tech Trends 2019 report developed by its team of technology experts. It identifies fundamental industry trends that will come to define the business technology landscape in 2019 – essentially covering those issues CIOs need to be aware of in the next 12 months. It certainly appears as if 2019 will be very eventful with the pace of change as rapid as ever: In the report, Group CTO Ettienne Reinecke claims that 2019 will finally see Digital Transformation become a reality and predicts a spate of industry-wide disruption as innovative companies see long-term projects bear fruit. In further good news for CIOs, the report predicts that game-changing technologies like AI, Machine Learning and robotic process automation will start to reach maturity. Reinecke said: “Until now, our industry has spoken about innovative technologies somewhat theoretically, without providing a clear picture of how these powerful new innovations will be used. Think analytics, Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Blockchain and containers, just to name a few. “That’s starting to change. The application of disruptive technologies is becoming more pervasive and their adoption is growing steadily. We’ll see the most innovative companies showing off truly impactful examples of Digital Transformation in action in 2019 with many more coming to market over the next three years. “They will then become so firmly embedded in the core processes and technologies we use that we’ll consider them commonplace. 2019 is the year that trailblazers will pull- away from fast-followers and we start to see significant power shifts across industries.” The whitepaper, Tech Trends 2019, has been developed by Dimension Data’s technology experts and identifies five further trends that will come to define the business technology landscape in 2019 which include: Robotic process automation will reshape customer experience The exponential growth in robotic process automation – such as Machine Learning, AI and heuristic neural networks – will give companies the ability to combine scenarios, increase understanding and make real-time predictive decisions about their customers’ needs and behaviours. Infrastructure will become programmable from end to end Companies will start subscribing to multiple cloud platforms and increasing their use of Tech trends CIOs need to be aware of in 2019 44 INTELLIGENTCIO www.intelligentcio.com