The trouble with the future of technology is we are able to describe it, to talk about it, and to imagine the benefits-- long before it is here.
You name it... space travel, desktop publishing, driverless autos, airplanes, invisibiliy cloaks or even hoverboards...and it always starts with our imagination. And our imagination carries the possibilities, the dreams to new heights before we actually get down to the details, to the work that makes it happen.
That often leads to misunderstanding and frustration, frustration so typical in technology that research company Gartner has made a fortune from depicting and tracking that frustration with their patented charts known as "Hype Cycles."
The journey to digital business continues as the key theme of of Gartner's "Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies, 2015."
New to the Hype Cycle this year is what Gartner calls "digital humanism" — the idea that people are the central focus in digital businesses and digital workplaces.
The Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies report is the longest-running annual Hype Cycle, providing a cross-industry perspective on the technologies and trends that business should consider in developing emerging-technology portfolios.
Betsy Burton, vice president and distinguished analyst at Gartner, says "This year, we encourage CIOs and other IT leaders to dedicate time and energy focused on innovation, rather than just incremental business advancement, while also gaining inspiration by scanning beyond the bounds of their industry."
Major changes in 2015 (see chart) include the placement of autonomous vehicles, which have shifted from pre-peak to peak of the Hype Cycle. While autonomous vehicles are still embryonic, this movement still represents a significant advancement, with all major automotive companies putting autonomous vehicles on their near-term roadmaps.
Similarly, the growing
momentum (from post-trigger to pre-peak) in connected-home solutions
has introduced entirely new solutions and platforms enabled by new
technology providers and existing manufacturers.
GARTNER: Six Business Era Models in the Digital Business Development Path
* Stage 1: Analog
* Stage 2: Web
* Stage 3: E-Business
* Stage 4: Digital Marketing
* Stage 5: Digital Business
* Stage 6: Autonomous
"As enterprises
continue the journey to becoming digital businesses, identifying and
employing the right technologies at the right time will be critical,"
said Ms. Burton. "As we have set out on the Gartner roadmap to digital
business, there are six progressive business era models that
enterprises can identify with today and to which they can aspire in the
future. However, since the Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies is
purposely focused on more emerging technologies, it mostly supports the
last three of these stages: Digital Marketing, Digital Business and
Autonomous."
Digital Marketing
(Stage 4): The digital marketing stage sees the emergence of the Nexus
of Forces (mobile, social, cloud and information). Enterprises in this
stage focus on new and more sophisticated ways to reach consumers, who
are more willing to participate in marketing efforts to gain greater
social connection, or product and service value. Enterprises that are
seeking to reach this stage should consider the following technologies
on the Hype Cycle: Gesture Control, Hybrid Cloud Computing, Internet of
Things (IoT), Machine Learning, People-Literate Technology,
Speech-to-Speech Translation.
Digital Business
(Stage 5): Digital business is the first post-nexus stage on the
roadmap and focuses on the convergence of people, business and things.
The IoT and the concept of blurring the physical and virtual worlds are
strong concepts in this stage. Physical assets become digitalized and
become equal actors in the business value chain alongside
already-digital entities, such as systems and apps. Enterprises seeking
to go past the Nexus of Forces technologies to become a digital
business should look to these additional technologies: 3D Bioprinting
for Life Science R&D, 3D Bioprinting Systems for Organ Transplant,
Human Augmentation, Affective Computing, Augmented Reality,
Bioacoustics Sensing, Biochips, Brain-Computer Interface, Citizen Data
Science, Connected Home, Cryptocurrencies, Cryptocurrency Exchange,
Digital Dexterity, Digital Security, Enterprise 3D Printing, Smart
Robots, Smart Advisors, Gesture Control, IoT, IoT Platform, Machine
Learning, Micro Data Centers, Natural-Language Question Answering,
Neurobusiness, People-Literate Technology, Quantum Computing,
Software-Defined Security, Speech-to-Speech Translation, Virtual
Reality, Volumetric and Holographic Displays, and Wearables.
Autonomous (Stage
6): Autonomous represents the final post-nexus stage. This stage is
defined by an enterprise's ability to leverage technologies that
provide humanlike or human-replacing capabilities. Using autonomous
vehicles to move people or products and using cognitive systems to
recommend a potential structure for an answer to an email, write texts
or answer customer questions are all examples that mark the autonomous
stage. Enterprises seeking to reach this stage to gain competitiveness
should consider these technologies on the Hype Cycle: Autonomous
Vehicles, Bioacoustic Sensing, Biochips, Brain-Computer Interface, Digital
Dexterity, Human Augmentation, Machine Learning, Neurobusiness,
People-Literate Technology, Quantum Computing, Smart Advisors, Smart
Dust, Smart Robots, Virtual Personal Assistants, Virtual Reality, and
Volumetric and Holographic Displays.
"Although we have
categorized each of the technologies on the Hype Cycle into one of the
digital business stages, enterprises should not limit themselves to
these technology groupings," said Ms. Burton. "Many early adopters have
embraced quite advanced technologies, for example, autonomous vehicles
or smart advisors, while they continue to improve nexus-related areas,
such as mobile apps."
While Gartner is
speaking directly to end users, their advice to end users is also the
solution provider's best roadmap to technology services. By following
the Gartner logic and advice, solution providers can anticipate the
technology curves and play their role in working hand-in-hand with
customers who are making tech transitions.
Additional
information is available in Gartner's "Hype Cycle for Emerging
Technologies, 2015." This report is part of Gartner's Hype Cycle
Special Report for 2015. This Special Report provides strategists and
planners with an assessment of the market hype, maturity, business
benefit and future direction of more than 2,000 technologies, grouped
into 112 areas.
Go Gartner's Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies, 2015