IT Trends Shaping Our World

The dot com era of the late 90's was supposedly the revolution. As it turns out (with most such revolutions) the actual revolution is yet to start. Once the initial euphoria of the new technology has died down is when the true implications of this technology and its users become apparent. We are today living on the cusp of such a revolutionary era. Some of the trends which are starting to shape our future include

Global Sourcing - What started out as a cost play because of the Y2K specter - has evolved into a global phenomenon aptly clarified by Tom Friedman in his book - The World is Flat. Well, not truly flat today but definitely moving in that direction. Global sourcing is allowing corporations and people to interact seamlessly across borders. It is creating a global workforce - unhindered by geography and physical limitations but brought together by supply and demand.

Emerging Markets - If you are looking for growth - look to China, India, South America and Russia (the BRIC). It's a time when a true middle class across the continents is emerging. A middle class with jobs, education, discretionary income, access to consumer products and awareness. It's a matter of time before the emerging market consumers become the largest consumer base being serviced by the global corporations.

IT Solutions - Even today we are reliant (in many cases heavily) on presumably obsolete technologies that make up the legacy backbone - the core back-end for many global organizations. But the days of such monolithic and complex systems may be limited. The advent of web services, browser based applications and the constant pressure for nimble, modularized and configurable applications is already having a huge impact on how applications are build and integrated. If you toss in SOA, open source software, on-demand computing and Web 2.0 technologies – it’s going to be a new way of constructing business applications.

Demanding Consumers - The information age is informing, educating and equipping today’s consumers with more choices. Constantly wired is not a catch phrase – it’s a reality. With information comes power and today’s consumers are not shy to exert this power. They are demanding, on-the-go, cost aware and quality conscious - you have to meet and generally exceed their needs. Speed to market, agility and technology are driving business growth

Convergence - Sometimes it feels like a gadget fest. So many devices, so many functions, so many needs - it can be daunting. A well-equipped information geek can be overwhelmed with the plethora of devices needed to function and live. There is bound to be convergence - both at an individual level and the space we inhabit. We will be carrying less but doing more and similarly having more in our office/home but dealing with less complexity and integration issues. The race to create convergence solutions is already on - it's a matter of time before we have mature solutions.

The world of tomorrow will be lot different from today. There are bound to be many players shaping the trends of tomorrow. The signs are omnipresent - finding the pioneers of tomorrow today is the challenge. Happy hunting!