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The last year has seen equal parts opportunity and disruption. Technological innovations have been a key enabler in addressing newer challenges, meeting newer expectations and elevating operations, as a whole. As Dell Technologies, we strived to help businesses in their digital transformation journey and their faith in us kept us as the leader in the x86 mainstream server market for 5 consecutive quarters with a 43.7 per cent share.
As 2023 rolls in, the expectation from technology is tremendous. In all my conversations with businesses, I am hearing how they are going to look to strengthen business resiliency, especially in the context of how they will adapt to manage larger volumes of data generated in real-time. Technological innovations will help corral the incredible data growth brought about by hyperconnectivity and help us build enhanced digital experiences for the end users in times to come.
Let us look at some of the key technology trends that will define 2023 based on my interactions with customers and business leaders:
Organizations will prioritize sustainability
Sustainability has long been a hot topic and, rightly so. Going forward, I expect organizations to adopt sustainable IT infrastructure or invest in solution providers that promise integrated environmental benefits, along with expanded services. With growing data needs and increasing energy costs, organizations will be focused on making their data centres greener to conserve valuable resources and reduce costs. Case in point, the recent launch of India’s first Green Data Center with alternative smart cooling technology is a testament to the fact that Indian organizations seek IT infrastructures that are environmentally sustainable, yet don’t compromise on digital transformation.
Organizations adopting multi-cloud strategies must embrace intentionality
Between data centres, colocation facilities, public clouds and edge locations, the IT landscape is certainly complicated. Businesses that have adopted multi-cloud to date may have done so to increase IT agility or speed, but they may have unintentionally created silos that lead to unpredictable costs, skills gaps and security and governance costs. This is a scenario that we call multi-cloud by default. Organizations must become more intentional in the locations they place their workloads and move towards a multi-cloud by design strategy. This means taking the time to thoughtfully assess your environment and ensure you’re operating everywhere you need to be and that your data is in the right location to work for you, be it in a private cloud, public clouds, co-location facilities, the edge, or a combination of all of these locations. This reduces complexity while increasing efficiency – you’ll have fewer data mobility concerns, fewer concerns about skills gaps and greater control over your IT environment.
Zero Trust will define cybersecurity needs
As businesses continue to embrace digital transformation, it results in a huge amount of data being online, increasing the potential cyber threat surface. Many businesses today have an understanding and are planning or deploying Zero Trust security architecture, but very few have fully implemented the cybersecurity model that shifts how organizations approach security from relying solely on perimeter defences to only allowing known authorized traffic. Jeff Clarke, Vice Chairman and Co-COO of Dell Technologies, recently shared his top tech predictions for 2023, on how technology will rise to meet new expectations in the data era. As per his predictions, the Zero Trust security architecture is based on three factors and three main tenets – universal continuous authentication of everything; robust authoritative policy-driven behaviour; and deeply integrated threat management. Business leaders across industries need to take a more holistic approach towards developing robust cybersecurity and data protection strategies with embedded security features designed into the hardware, firmware and security control points. This holistic approach will help organizations achieve Zero Trust architectures to strengthen cyber resiliency and reduce security complexity.
With the change in business resilience priorities, organizations need to shift their focus to a proactive security strategy which not only caters to data needs at the perimeter but also secures the supply chain. Until businesses consider cyber recovery in an as-a-service model, their cybersecurity plan needs to ensure that their protection is not only limited to their infrastructure but is extended to their applications and data.
Edge will further integrate with multi-cloud to deliver simplified real-time solutions
According to the recent 2023 resolutions shared by John Roese, Global CTO, Dell Technologies, though multi-cloud edge platforms are just emerging, it is critical to make a decision now about what you want your edge to look like in the future. As Indian businesses become digital-first, with heavy data workloads that need advanced and simplified solutions on-site, edge technologies continue to play an increasingly significant role in the IT ecosystem moving forward. With edge, data can be securely acted upon in near-real time at the point of creation to add more value for businesses. I see tremendous growth in edge solutions in the market where devices, infrastructure, and data come together to deliver real-time insights at scale. As businesses transition to multi-cloud ecosystems, it would be important for them to analyze what their edge architecture needs will be. Doing so will vastly benefit end-users in terms of reduced latency and seamless connectivity, as well as enhanced privacy protection and data security.
5G deployment will augment the need for security
While 5G offers huge performance improvements in bandwidth and latency creating completely new use cases, it also enables more and more devices to be connected to the network. This creates a massive new pool of connected devices or endpoints and a wider attack surface. The security of these endpoints must be managed throughout their lifecycle. Businesses must build effective and long-term cyber resiliency strategies to mitigate potential threats.
Looking into next year, business resilience, innovation and sustainability underscored by futuristic technologies would continue to drive business agendas across industries. 2023 will of course come with its own set of challenges, but I am optimistic that businesses will be able to adapt with agility – the key here will be how prepared businesses are to embrace new roadmaps but as I said, I’m optimistic and excited for what lies ahead.
Written by Manish Gupta, Vice President and General Manager, Infrastructure Solutions Group, Dell Technologies India
