Virtualization and Cloud executives share their predictions for 2016.  Read them in this 8th Annual VMblog.com series exclusive.

Contributed by Adam Wray, CEO, Basho Technologies

2016 is the Year of Data as a Service

Internet of Things: IDC predicts that, moving forward, more and more verticals will support and use IoT data. From factory sensors to wearables and smart textiles, data has quickly become the the lifeblood across several industries. The ability to leverage that data is critical. At the heart of IoT value lies the database. Without the right solution in place the impact an organization's ability to scale cost-effectively and with ease while keeping data correct and available at speed becomes significantly impacted.  Not only has it become clear that traditional relational databases cannot manage the scale of IoT data, but many databases are also ill-equipped to handle the specialized nature of IoT data sets, including time series data - data that is created with a timestamp.

In response, computing will continue to mature in efforts to collect, store, and analyze time series data to harness IoT's power. Businesses that are able to harness this data will gain valuable insights, embark upon digital transformations and drive more effective customer engagements. The deluge of Internet of Things data represents an opportunity, but also a burden for organizations that must find ways to generate actionable information from (mostly) unstructured data. Organizations will be seeking database solutions that are optimized for the different types of IoT data and multi-model approaches that make managing the mix of data types less operationally complex.

The trend in IoT computing will be two-fold: a move toward tailored technology stacks, and a renewed interest in databases as the core of IoT digital strategies.

The challenge for companies will be to choose the right technology stack to leverage this data for real-time insights to deliver real customer value. PwC writes, "In essence, the tech industry coalesces around an IT stack of hardware and software capabilities and interfaces that create the full system. The IoT stack is rapidly approaching this level of maturity to become something PwC calls the Thing Stack." In 2016, I predict that we'll see big advances in delivering technology stacks that integrate key components of the distributed data tier. These stacks will take away much of the technology complexity making it more consumable in the enterprise and bring operational simplicity to solving this challenge."

##

About the Author

Adam Wray is a cloud enterprise technology entrepreneur and executive with more than 20 years of experience. Most recently, he served as CEO and President of Tier 3, where he led the company through nearly $20 million in venture capital funding, growing it from a startup with a small client portfolio and revenue stream to an eight-figure annual run-rate ($10M+). Prior to Tier 3, Wray held operational leadership roles at Amazon, Akamai Technologies, and Limelight Networks. He currently sits on the Board of Directors for Basho Technologies and is a non-executive director of Cloudsoft Corporation, 6fusion USA, and Observable Networks.