
Virtualization and Cloud executives share their predictions for 2017. Read them in this 9th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.
Contributed by David Linthicum, Senior Vice President at Cloud Technology Partners
Five Cloud Predictions
1.
Large acquisitions become commonplace. While we'll see lots of small
companies being purchased, we'll see some game changers as well. Some of these deals will be about survival, and
some will actually be 1+1=3. The
mega-companies no longer have a choice, given the pressures of cloud computing.
2.
More focus on management and operations. Now that we have Global 2000 companies
pushing past 500 workloads, most will find their tipping point. This means that they can no longer manage
their cloud resources using manual processes.
Thus, the focus on management and operations will be much greater in
2017, including big and small companies cashing in on the micro-trends that will
be within the macro-trend.
3.
Containers grow, but not at the rate
predicted. One of the biggest
technology pushes in the last few years has been containers. While they are important, we're not likely to
see the growth that we expected. This is
largely due to the fact that, while net new applications are great fits for
containers because you can design them from the start for containers, order
applications are a tougher fit.
4.
Lagging cloud talent reaches a crisis. Most of the analysts' firms are
calling for the lack of cloud architecture and development talent to limit the
migration into the cloud for most companies.
This is going to be much more profound in 2017, to a point that
companies will be paying signing bonuses over $100k for the right people. This will diminish over time, considering
that many others will push themselves into the cloud computing field to cash
in.
5.
We'll see more on-premises breaches. More traditional systems will fall victim to
hackers in 2017, while cloud-based security becomes much stronger. Clouds will be the hardest systems to break
into, given the layers of sophisticated security, and proactive updating and
monitoring. Traditional systems don't
enjoy the same protections; they are more vulnerable and will be the likely
targets.
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About the Author
David Linthicum - Senior Vice President
As a SVP at Cloud
Technology Partners, David provides core leadership in client
engagements and strategic guidance for the company. Additionally, David
leads key thought leadership activities for CTP including keynote
presentations at most major cloud computing conferences and is a routine
contributor to Forbes, The Wall Street Journal and Businessweek. David
writes the cloud column for InfoWorld and is the lead author of The
Doppler, CTP's cloud news and best practices publication. With more than
13 books on computing, 3,000 published articles, 500 conference
presentations and numerous appearances on radio and TV programs, David
has spent the last 30 years teaching businesses how to use resources
more productively and innovate constantly. He has expanded the vision of
both startups and established corporations as to what is possible and
achievable. David's experience with cloud computing dates back to 1999
when he published a key paper about the use of infrastructure resources
that can be delivered over the open Internet.
David's industry
experience includes tenures as CTO and CEO of several successful public
and private software companies, and upper-level management positions in
Fortune 100 companies. David has delivered over $2 billion dollars in
value by transforming companies from traditional to innovative
technologies, moving them to lucrative exits that benefitted investors,
employees, and customers. Prior to joining Cloud Technology Partners,
David founded Blue Mountain Labs, a cloud computing consulting and
advisory firm (sold to Bick Ventures in Feb. 2010).
David
is a graduate from George Mason University in Fairfax Virginia, and
still remains active with the alumni. He has been an adjunct professor
of computer science for over 10 years and teaches courses on system
design and database engineering.