Industry executives and experts share their predictions for 2024. Read them in this 16th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.
Broadcom/VMware, AI, Ransomware, Oh My!
By Yan Ness, CEO VergeIO
Trends in enterprise IT tend to be more evolutionary than revolutionary. This means you don’t need a crystal ball, tarot cards or tea leaves to necessarily predict what is coming in the industry. In fact, many of next year’s biggest stories will center on results of things previously put in motion. From Broadcom’s fully realized acquisition of VMware to the next steps in AI, continued shifts in the labor market and the latest approaches to protecting assets from cyberattacks, we have a good idea of what to expect in 2024. That said, here are my (maybe not so) bold predictions for what’s in store for the coming year:
- 1000s of VMware customers will find an alternative but will struggle to adopt it.
There is no “plug compatible” swap out of esxi or any other VMware product. That means customers will have to change more than just VMware to get rid of VMware. And Broadcom knows that…look for large price increases, but at least support will get worse.
Those that succeed will pick an alternative that has the easiest migration of all and delivers exponentially better value (like 1/10 the overall cost, 10x security and 10x performance…)
- AI will suck most of the air out of the room but provide little actual juice (revenue) for most.
Many companies are “AI-washing” their roadmaps, investment thesis and entire ethos of their companies. And of course most well funded (if not all) will have AI as their central theme. Lots of people will make some really bad investments though.
Every company doesn’t have an AI ethos but every company needs to contemplate AI on their product roadmap. It’s a lot of hot air but not much uptake. While we have AI on our roadmap, and use narrow AI to enable running on any x86 box, none, and I mean 0, of our inbound leads are asking for anything related to AI. So while it’s a lot of air, it’s not much juice. That will come in future years.
- Skills gap and staffing shortages will exacerbate
The demand for new technology skills to accommodate the AI rush combined with a tight labor market and unending battle over where employees work will cause IT recruiters to continue to struggle to find (qualified) candidates.
This may be somewhat relieved by the current over staffing of some behemoth tech companies. Salesforce and VMware are two examples of companies realizing maybe they don’t need as many employees as they have.
- Ransomware will grow exponentially and I predict a major, national cyber event in 2024
The above challenges and growing complexity will expose more vulnerable to successful attacks.
Wars around the world will increase the attacks on US entities in the US. Bad actors and anti-US sentiment will make us an even bigger target. Think infrastructure like power, water, internet and fuel delivery.
The election will attract additional bad actors, some incredibly sophisticated and well funded.
- Oh yeah and it’s an election year.
This will cause some pause in spending and investment as we all watch to see who’s in charge next. Of course the disfunction will continue and probably accelerate.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Yan Ness is an early stage tech entrepreneur, investor, advisor and board member with over 35 years’ experience in the software and cloud space. From an early age Yan has had a keen interest in all things computers and software, earning a computer science degree from the University of Michigan in 1985. Yan has founded or acquired then ran as principal operator then successfully exited four companies all in the software and infrastructure space. Today Yan serves as CEO, investor and board member of Verge.io. Yan also serves as a board advisor to LightGuide Systems and Larky both of Michigan.
