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11/24/2014 @ 10:29AM

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Forrester: Top IT Predictions for

2015
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The analysts at Forrester Research have been blogging this month about their
top IT predictions for 2015. Heres my take on the predictions which cover all
IT trends, technologies, opportunities and challenges, from mobile to security
and big data analytics and from the Internet of Things (IoT) to the changing
role of the CIO.
The gap between digital leaders and digital laggards will widen in 2015
The trouble with digitization is that it does not slow down. Even worse for
those expecting to catch their breath, it unexpectedly moves by leaps and
bounds. The companies that havent grasped what it can do for their business
and what its doing to their competitive environment or the companies that
are slow to experiment and innovate, are doomed to lose more ground in
2015. Every aspect of the digitization of everything, from mobile solutions to
privacy and security, is a source for competitive differentiation by the
companies that get it. Forrester: 2015 will serve as an inflection point where
companies that successfully harness digital technology to advantageously
serve customers will create clear competitive separation from those that do
not.
Almost half of the world will have a powerful computer in their pocket and
vastly different expectations from your business in 2015
The twin sister of the digitization of everything is the mobilization of
everything. 42% of the total population globally will own a smartphone by
the end of 2015, predicts Forrester. These always-connected consumers and
workers will abandon your business if it does not understand where they are
and what they want. Forrester: Consumers are undergoing a mobile mind
shift: the expectation that [they] can get what [they] want in [their]
immediate context and moments of need.
The Web is rapidly being replaced by the computers in our pocketsalready
more time is spent on mobile apps than on the Web. Mobile has reached a
tipping point in 2014, says Forrester, as it solidified its position as one of the
most disruptive technologies for businesses in decades. Consumers expect to
engage with brands to get any information or service they desire immediately
and in context. Today, 18% of US online consumers have this expectation,
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while 30% are in the midst of a transition to this mobile mind shift.
Apple will rule 2015
Apples recent product announcements paved the way to what could be the
best year ever for the company, possibly reaching $1 trillion (with a T) in
market cap (that will require an almost 50% appreciation from last Fridays
close; the stock is up 56% from a year ago). With mobile payments and
wearables, Apple may energize, expand and lead two new markets. Forrester:
Apple Pay will influence every discussion of mobile payments through 2015
and Apple is poised to drive the smartwatch market and, once again,
catalyze a new category of products and experiences. Forrester estimates
that 7% of US online adults (15+ million) are ready to buy an Apple Watch
and that the market for US mobile payments will expand from $52 billion in
2014 to $142 billion by 2019.
More money spent on security will lead to more security breaches-related
losses
As weve learned again and again, the digitization of everything leads to
security holes everywhere. Increased investment in security, however, is not
correlated with better security or with increased investment in the right
reaction to the inevitable breach. Forrester: In 2015, there will be large
increases in security budgets, with double-digit growth in some sectors
[but] more security budget doesnt guarantee better security or even
increased security maturity A large majority of companies will discover a
breach but botch the response.
60% of enterprises will discover a breach in 2015 but only 21% of enterprises
report that improving incident response is a critical priority, says Forrester.
This is a sorry state of affairs as the digitization of everything leads to new
opportunities for the bad guys. For example, the quest for security will
dominate the US payments marketplace throughout 2015, says Forrester.
But it also leads to new opportunities for the good guys to stand out from the
crowd by better protecting customer data: Today, about a third of security
decision-makers in North America and Europe view privacy as a competitive
differentiator. Forrester expects to see half of enterprises share this
sentiment by the end of 2015.
Data is the new product
As ones and zeros eat the world, data is the new product and data science is
the new process of innovation, I wrote earlier this year. Forrester: Data as a
product or service will create new revenue and customer value streams. In
2015, we will see data services become a mainstream aspect of product
offerings, as Do you want data services with that? becomes a familiar
refrain, says Forrester.
While big data investments have been directed in the past primarily to
mining the flood of external data (The number of business and technology
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leaders telling us that external data is important to their business strategy has
been growing rapidly from one-third in 2012 to almost half in 2014), the
focus is shifting to unearthing the value of the dataexternal and
internalthat is unique to the company. Forrester: Firms will be taking a
hard look at their data exhaust and wondering if there is a market for new
products and services based on their unique set of data in many cases, the
value in the data is not that people will be willing to pay money for bulk
downloads or access to raw data, but in data products that complement a
firms existing offerings.
The data business is not just for companies, but also for individuals, turning
data scientists into data entrepreneurs. Forrester: Now that data scientists
can in effect publish algorithms to an app store, they can monetize their
research, knowledge, and creativity.
Many established companies will become venture capitalists
It used to be that established companies bought innovation by acquiring
startups and smaller companies. In the high-tech sector, acquisitions have
also been supplemented by strategic investments in promising startups.
This approach to building a portfolio of innovations and bringing talent into
the companys sphere of influence is now taking hold in other industries. The
digitization of everything leads to the venture capitalization of everything.
Case in point is what is perceived to be one of the most sober, steady, and
sedate industries around, insurance, where a continuing flow of venture
capital, says Forrester, will open up new categories for digital innovation.
What Forrester says about smart insurers applies to companies in other
industries that are rapidly being digitized. The smart insurers are
recognizing that in the need to generate more good ideas faster, they have to
radically change how they develop and execute new thinking. That means
that insurers need to short cut the industrys traditional well build and
control culture and instead go into the market, spot a hot business
technology start-up that brings a lot of whats needed to create a minimum
viable product, and partner with them.
Some sectors will not see the fruits of digitization for a long time
While insurers (at least the smart ones) and established companies in other
industries are adopting the high-tech lifestyle (fail fast, anyone?), other
sectors of the economy, while being rapidly digitized, will not see the benefits
anytime soon. In a stunning counter-statement to the hype about how IT is
transforming the healthcare industry, Forrester says In the years from
2020 to 2030, look for the vast array of innovation to be made globally
operational as some of these significant investments start to affect the way in
which most humans receive care. Its not a typo; we have to wait for the next
decade to start seeing the impact of current investments.
Healthcare is one sector of the economy that does not lend itself well for
next-year predictions as far as information technology is concerned and

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possibly not even to ten or twenty-year predictions. Gideon Gartner, one of

the godfathers of the market research industry to which Forrester belongs,
wrote in 1978: Health care delivery will be revolutionized by 1990, with most
large metropolitan areas having implemented vertically-integrated health
facilities coordinated by computer [including] physicians offices,
neighborhood health care centers, hospitals, university medical centers,
nursing homes, rehabilitation centers and home health care.
The Cloud is the New Normal
Forrester predicts that the Nadella Way will triumph and Microsoft will
make more profit [in 2015] from cloud than on-premise. The cloud will
become a mainstream option, an integral part of an organizations IT strategy
and deployment. Forrester: In 2015, cloud adoption will accelerate and
technology management groups must adapt to this reality by learning how to
add value to their companys use of these services through facilitation,
adaptation and evangelism. The days of fighting the cloud are over.
The cloud will also play an important role in the expansion and utilization of
the Internet of Things (IoT): In 2015 well see increased focus on the
software and especially the cloud services to make all these sensors connect,
upload data, and drive analytics that generate insights and enable business
improvements.
In 2015, many organizations will answer the question Whos your digital
daddy? with a three-letter acronym
Who is in charge of the digital transformation of the business? Forrester tells
us that 39% of CEOs believe that they personally set digital strategy for their
firms, but only 26% of other executives believe their CEO actually owns
digital strategy.
Adding to the confusion, many CEOs are by-passing their CIOs, giving the
digital reins to a newly hired Chief Digital Officer (CDO). Forrester, unlike
Gartner and IDC, thinks this is an unnecessary move, adamantly
recommending not adding yet another three-letter acronym to the C-suite.
2015 will be the year that CIOs can prove that the CDO role is unnecessary,
says Forrester. Are all CIOs up for the challenge? No. But in 2015, any CIO
that isnt will be replaced by a one that is.
Moreover, traditional technology organizations, led by CIOs, are on the cusp
of a significant pivot, shifting focus from maintaining operational systems to
implementing the digital capabilities that win, serve, and retain customers.
The digital leaps and bounds force the issue, as only someone with the CIOs
experience and skill in coordinating (and yes, controlling) all IT activities
across the enterprise, can provide the urgently needed digital governance.
Forresters predictions and estimates provide a glimpse into the digital chaos,
where business units rush to embrace the latest technology and the
enterprise suffers from unnecessary duplication and lack of beneficial

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coordination. As in Analytics spending will increase, but less of it will be

visible in the CIOs budget and Only 7% percent of enterprises surveyed had
an organization in place to enable the use of mobile to transform customer
experiences throughout the entire business, and at the most, we expect to see
25% of companies do so in 2015.
The CIO is the new CDO.
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