Industry executives and experts share their predictions for 2020. Read them in this 12th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.
By Kamesh Pemmaraju, Platform9
Three Key Tech Trends Coming in 2020
In recent years, Kubernetes has
drastically changed the software delivery landscape. But like any other facet
of tech, the only constant is change. Here is a look forward at what
industry-defining trends will shape the landscape in 2020 and beyond.
Containerization
Will Take Another Step Forward
In this year (and even before), we have
seen many organizations employing containers to help streamline their development
pipelines. However, for many mainstream enterprises, this has meant "kicking
the tires" and proofs of concept for relatively small clusters. But as
smaller-scale applications prove to drive value, we're expecting to see
companies scale rapidly.
With this scaling, we expect to see a big
increase in the focus put on something we call the "ilities" -- availability,
reliability, upgradability, maintainability, and scalability -- as it relates
to containers. How can we take all the benefits of the containers we've
implemented with success and grow them to impact the business at large?
Enterprises are up for the challenge -- but it's going to be a big step forward
for many organizations.
The
Growth of the Thick Edge
This trend will shape the landscape for the
next several years -- that is, the shift of data to the edge. Driven by the
Internet of Things (IoT), telecom coverage continued expansion, and the
proliferation of smart devices -- from appliances to home security products, to
automobiles -- we expect to see a massive change in the flow of data.
As this growth of the IoT and smart
devices reaches a tipping point, we expect to see a good percentage of data
that is generated at the edge. With all of this edge data will come a
corresponding need for data processing. The real impact of edge data will be in
making data-driven decisions nearly instantaneously. The act of taking edge
data and transporting it to a data center may slow down the process enough to
limit its value and effectiveness. So with that in mind, we predict the growth
of something called the "thick edge."
Essentially this means that data is not
only being produced by the edges, but will also be consumed and processed at
the edge - as computations at the edge become the norm.
In this instance, smart sensors will not
just be capable of collecting data but also having some level of processing
power to interpret what it collects. These sensors will then transmit the
information to an intermediate location -- the place known as the "thick edge" --
which will have more processing power and can help relay information back.
Edge
Networking and Security at Scale
As data production and processing move
towards the edge, it will also influence another large trend for the year to
come -- how to manage networking and security as the core data systems become
increasingly decentralized. In 2020, we expect to see some very interesting
applications come to light that addresses these challenges. We also anticipate
that more instances on containers and Kubernetes will move towards the edge as
well and help solve some of these challenges.
It is an incredibly exciting time to be in the world
of tech. As customer expectations increase and applications become increasingly
complex and sophisticated, the challenges and opportunities are many. Keep an
eye out for these trends to take shape in the next year and change the way you
build and deploy software.
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About the Author
Kamesh leads product
marketing at Platform9. Prior to joining Platform9, Kamesh has several years of
product management and marketing experience at Dell, Mirantis and
ZeroStack focused on delivering open source private and hybrid cloud solutions
to enterprises and service providers.