Industry executives and experts share their predictions for 2023.  Read them in this 15th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.

Companies will shift from measuring growth by quarters to finding more value in digital business

By Lenley Hensarling, Chief Product Officer, Aerospike

The pandemic brought unprecedented growth to digital businesses, typically measured in quarter-to-quarter metrics. However, with global economic uncertainty due to supply chain issues and the war in Ukraine, this growth has stalled. This is causing companies to shift to measuring the value of each transaction and project to derive greater value. Companies will continue to feel the business impact of 2022 throughout 2023 and laser in on ways to innovate with fewer resources. 

Real-time data demands will grow to mitigate risk

Real-time data will continue to grow at 30%+ in 2023, as will the need for an accurate, holistic, real-time view of a business. For example, financial institutions compute risk models every five minutes rather than every few hours to understand how to navigate change. Delayed responses can cost millions and derail service to customers. When these entities modernize their infrastructure, they'll also strengthen the integrity and the compliance of transactions. Following the lead of financial services, a larger percentage of companies will mitigate risk with real-time data. The process will become more mainstream, expanding beyond the financial services sector, which we'll discuss later. 

Organizations will search for the sweet spot for how much data to hold at the edge

When processing petabytes of data, it's important to determine how much and what type of data to hold at the edge. Holding every piece of data at the edge is inefficient and costly. Holding too little at the edge can result in delays in identifying a fraudulent transaction or in a split-second decision required by an autonomous vehicle processing how to avoid an obstacle. Organizations must find the right balance to meet SLAs while maintaining operational margins. Understanding data's maximum speed, performance and accuracy will allow for wise infrastructure investment. 

Businesses will place a renewed focus on the total cost of ownership (TCO) 

In a time of economic uncertainty, costs are under the microscope. In 2023, there will be an increased focus on finding greater value while lowering costs to increase profitability. During this shift, there will be a marked shift toward prioritizing profitability and operating margin by examining the total cost of ownership (TCO) rather than relying on the aforementioned traditional quarter-to-quarter growth metrics. Companies will seek a modern real-time data platform that delivers predictable performance at any scale, with low latency, while reducing TCO. 

Measuring TCO includes many considerations: deploying infrastructure that requires a minimal amount of setup resources and reducing the number of servers required to process volumes of data, to name just two. Choosing the right real-time data platform up front will benefit the organization long-term by reducing the need for costly re-platforming to meet the future demands of exponential data growth. 

Industries will rapidly adapt to meet real-time demand

As we mentioned before, many sectors will be quicker than others to embrace real-time data for action, including the following. 

Telecom - With the 5G rollout, real-time data platforms will drive the adoption of AI and ML technologies in telecom. These evolving technologies will create new products and services that require high-speed connectivity, which will be operationally scrutinized to ensure margin control while expanding.

Online Gaming - Online gaming will continue its explosion of growth, despite global economic uncertainty. It's financially efficient: A gamer can use the same system repeatedly, rather than spending on new experiences out of the home. However, online gaming companies will be tasked with controlling costs while meeting the demand for always-on, consistent performance with low latency at any scale and affordable cost.

Sustainability - Gartner projects that the ambitious greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and sustainability targets will challenge businesses in 2023 and beyond. To reduce costs and meet these targets, enterprises will seek modern real-time databases that reduce the number of servers required to process transactions, which lessens their carbon footprint. Reducing CO2 emissions while increasing software efficiency will be a trend to watch. 

The old adage "The only thing that's certain is change" rings even more true for 2023. Though there will be pressure across any organization, the companies that focus on enhancing the value of real-time data for customers, better managing data at the edge, and addressing the TCO of its infrastructure will survive and thrive.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lenley Hensarling is the Chief Product Officer of Aerospike. Lenley has more than 30 years of experience in engineering management, product management, and operational management at both startups and large successful software companies. Lenley previously held executive positions at Novell, Enterworks, JD Edwards, EnterpriseDB, and Oracle. He has extensive experience in delivering value to customers and shareholders in both enterprise applications and infrastructure software. Lenley believes that business is now happening in real-time and that the right infrastructure for serving data to new real-time applications is a rapidly accelerating requirement for businesses to succeed.