Green
IT to Gain Momentum Through 2009, Driven by Concerns of Climate Change and
Opportunities to Save Costs Through Energy
Efficiency
Egham, U.K., August 11, 2008 —
Gartner, Inc. has identified 27 emerging technologies and predicts that eight of
these will have a transformational business impact and should be strongly
considered for adoption by technology planners in the next 10 years, according
to the report "Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies, 2008."
"Although Web 2.0 is now entering
the Trough of Disillusionment, it will emerge within two years to have
transformational impact, as companies steadily gain more experience and success
with both the technologies and the cultural implications," said Jackie Fenn,
vice president and Gartner Fellow. "Later — in between two and five years —
cloud computing and service-oriented architecture (SOA), which is moving up the
Slope of Enlightenment, will deliver transformation in terms of driving deep
changes in the role and capabilities of IT. Finally, public virtual worlds,
which are suffering from disillusionment after their peak of hype in 2007, will
in the long term represent an important media channel to support and build
broader communities of interest."
Technologies and trends at or around
the peak of the Hype Cycle in 2008 (see Figure 1) that will reach the plateau in
two to five years are:
- Green IT —
Along with broader societal
pressure for environmentally sustainable solutions, IT has the opportunity —
and in many cases, a requirement — to improve the "greenness" of its own
activities, as well as to contribute to broader company and industry
environmental initiatives.
- Cloud computing
— As companies seek to consume their
IT services in the most cost-effective way, interest is growing in drawing a
broad range of services (for example, computational power, storage and
business applications) from the "cloud," rather than from on-premises
equipment. Many types of technology providers are aligning themselves with
this trend, with the result that confusion and hype will continue for at least
another year before distinct submarkets and market leaders emerge.
- Social
computing platforms — Following the
phenomenal success of consumer-oriented social networking sites, such as
MySpace and Facebook, companies are examining the role that these sites, or
their enterprise-grade equivalents, will play in future collaboration
environments. The scope is also expanding to incorporate the notion of social
"platforms," or environments for a broad range of developers to build on the
basic application.
- Video
telepresence — High-end videoconferencing systems
(for example, from HP, Cisco, Teliris and others) that utilize large,
high-definition (HD) displays and components to show life-size images of
participants in meeting rooms or suites have proven significantly more
effective than earlier generations of videoconferencing technology in
providing a strong sense of in-room presence between remote participants. High
cost is currently the barrier to broader adoption.
- Microblogging —
Pioneered by Twitter (although
other services such as FriendFeed or Plurk are also available), microblogging
is a relatively new addition to the world of social networking, in which
contributors post a stream of very short messages providing information about
their current activity or thoughts, which can then be subscribed to by others.
The phenomenon has caught on among certain online communities, and
leading-edge companies are investigating its role in enhancing other social
media and channels.
Figure 1. Hype Cycle
for Emerging Technologies, 2008
Source:
Gartner (July 2008)
"Following the trend of the last few
years, many of the new entries on this year's Hype Cycle, including
microblogging, social networking platforms and cloud computing, are making their
impact in the consumer world before they hit businesses," Ms Fenn said. "Other
technologies that have passed the trigger where they start to be interesting to
businesses include 3-D printing, surface computing, augmented reality and mobile
robots. We expect early adopters to start applying these in novel ways and
driving new classes of application, such as using 3-D printers to dramatically
change the supply chain by creating products and replacement parts at the point
of need."
Ms Fenn has been authoring the Hype
Cycle for emerging trends for 13 years. She said the emerging technologies Hype
Cycle focuses on strategic technology and innovative function within IT. It is
the broadest aggregate of Gartner's Hype Cycles, highlighting emerging
technologies from all areas of IT that technology planners should evaluate as
part of their emerging-technology plans.
"The Hype Cycle should be used along
with a planning model such as the Priority Matrix (see Figure 2), which
highlights the technologies we believe are worth adopting early because of their
potentially high impact," Ms. Fenn said. "However, the actual benefit will vary
significantly across industries so planners need to ascertain which of these
individual opportunities relate most closely to their organizational
requirements."
Figure 2. Priority Matrix for
Emerging Technologies, 2008
|
years
to mainstream adoption | ||||
|
|
less than 2
years |
2 to 5
years |
5 to 10
years |
more than 10
years |
|
transformational |
Web
2.0 |
Cloud
Computing Public
Virtual Worlds SOA |
3-D
Printing Context
Delivery Architecture RFID
(Case/Pallet) |
Mobile
Robots |
|
high |
|
Electronic
Paper Green
IT Location-Aware
Applications Service-Oriented
Business Applications Solid-State
Drives |
Behavioral
Economics |
Augmented
Reality |
|
moderate |
Basic Web
Services Corporate
Blogging |
Idea
Management Microblogging Social
Computing Platforms Social Network
Analysis Tablet
PC Video
Telepresence Wikis |
Surface
Computers Virtual
Assistants |
Erasable Paper
Printing Systems |
|
low |
|
|
|
|
|
|
As
of July 2008 |
|
|
|
Source:
Gartner (July 2008)
Ms Fenn is co-author
of Gartner's upcoming book "Mastering the Hype Cycle: How to Adopt the Right
Innovation at the Right Time" to be published by Harvard Business Press in
October. Ms Fenn and Mark Raskino, vice president and Gartner Fellow, explain a
market-tested approach that offers a smarter way for companies to sort through
the hype and choose the right innovations at the right time. The book can be
pre-ordered at http://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Hype-Cycle-Innovation-Gartner/dp/1422121100/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1216662511&sr=8-1
In addition, Ms Fenn
discusses Gartner's Hype Cycles for 2008 with Gartner Research Vice President
and Distinguished Analyst Jeff
Comport in a podcast available at http://www.gartner.com/it/products/podcasting/asset_203008_2575.jsp
About
Gartner
Gartner, Inc.
(NYSE: IT) is the world's leading information technology research and advisory
company. Gartner delivers the technology-related insight necessary for its
clients to make the right decisions, every day. From CIOs and senior IT leaders
in corporations and government agencies, to business leaders in high-tech and
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their individual role. Founded in 1979, Gartner is headquartered in Stamford , Connecticut , U.S.A.
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