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Author
Richard Leung
Category Manager - Data & VoIP
Macquarie Telecom
The beginning of 2009 has been marked by further deterioration in the world
economy, and the impact of recession is shaping the direction of the Australian
ICT market. More businesses are revising their investment plans. Some have
started to scale back on new ICT investment. Others are looking at leveraging
ICT to deliver operational cost saving or new revenue generation. So what are
the hot top ten ICT market predictions that will gain further momentum in the
face of economic downturn?
 Here are the
top ten predictions in ICT we believe will continue well into the next 10
years:
- Business will be looking to ICT as an option to reduce business cost, to
save with ICT but not necessary saving on ICT.
- Capacity planning and asset management will be more rigorous. It is all
about having better control and right sizing. IT Managers will need more
sophisticated management tools for effective planning, visibility and
control. Resources will be used to focus more on existing network and
services rather than new major ICT infrastructure projects.
- More enterprise will be moving towards Unified Communications as a way
to increase productivity. In particular, UC will be used to support the
mobile workforce. Integration of UC with business application will continue
to deliver increased operational efficiency and sales process.
- Substantial increase in uptake of mobile data applications to increase
sales through more flexible and effective customer engagement as well as
operational efficiency.
- Cloud computing is gaining momentum as enterprises explore ways to
reduce complexity in data and application management. The portable low cost
browser as the thin client working with virtualized servers and applications
hosted in a Data centre will become the de-facto model for future business
applications. Google Apps is already pushing ahead in this direction.
- Enterprise will continue to embrace the Web 2.0 and Enterprise 2.0 to
reduce operational cost and enable increased revenue generation.
Applications such as Enterprise Wiki and Microsoft Sharepoint will be a cost
effective model for collaboration and resources sharing.
- Virtualisation, which has been one of the hottest subjects in town, will
become even more popular as enterprises looking for cost optimisation and
consolidation. The mandate of Going Green will put further weight onto this
trend.
- Outsourcing, in particular in the mid-market segment, will be actively
pursued to reduce IT resources requirement. Service such as managed CPE will
be high on the shopping list.
- Teleworking will become more commonplace due to increase demand on
productivity and access to contracted specialist staff. The increase of
travel cost and time to work due to traffic jam and unreliable public
transport services will add further justification to the case.
- Equipment and software leasing & management will become more popular to
alleviate short-term cash flow outlay. This trend will fuel the growth of
Software as a Service (SaaS) and Communication as a Service (CaaS) by
adopting a service subscription model. The pay per user model will eliminate
the need to tie up precious capital into purchasing of hardware, software
and services. Hardware leasing services such as rented router will become
increasingly popular.
 An important
implication of the above trends is that the IP network is becoming an integral
part of the delivery of these solutions. It acts as a data highway to connect
business critical applications to their users. This puts extra demands on the
quality of the network. It has to have increased level of intelligence to be
application aware and high security to ensure data integrity is not compromised.
As the network becomes a critical part of the daily business operation, it has
to be reliable with maximum uptime. Any network failure will have significant
impact to all parts of the business. Scalability is also an important element,
both for scaling up and down, as consolidation may be required in time of
business uncertainty.
To be successful in getting through this turbulence time, businesses have to
find a trusted network & hosting partner who can work closely with them and
their SIs to deliver these solutions in the most effective manner. A network &
hosting partner who has the extensive experience and knowledge in these areas
will ensure successful implementation every time while minimising risk of
failure and hiccups. In addition, the network partner must be able to provide
network services that can meet all the requirements we have discussed above.
We believe that those who can balance business risks by actively exploiting
these new opportunities and to act fast with the appropriate partner(s) will
likely not only to survive, but to come out from this crisis stronger ever.
Now how can we help you?
Got a question for Richard Leung on the future of ICT services in Australia? Email your question
here.
Contact Macquarie Telecom
for information on how we can help you prepare your data infrastructure for the
future.
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