Life is slowly getting normal post pandemic and people are moving on with their day-to-day lives with full gusto. Now is the time when technology trends are on a high and are primarily responsible for driving business, especially digital business.

According to a report, 93% of IT leaders say that better customer-facing technology is crucial for remaining competitive in the marketplace. Customer expectations are sky high and only expected to grow further. Businesses need to evolve to keep up.

“CEOs know they must accelerate the adoption of digital business and are seeking more direct digital routes to connect with their customers,” says David Groombridge, VP Analyst, Gartner. “But with an eye on future economic risks, they also want to be efficient and protect margins and cash flow,” he adds.

“We’ll experience more technological progress in the coming decade than we did in the preceding 100 years put together”, says McKinsey.

How technology trends drive digital business

Research shows that the top strategic technology trends will accelerate digital capabilities and drive growth by solving common business challenges for CIOs and technology executives. These trends will offer a roadmap to make your organization stand tall and will fulfil business objectives and position CIOs and IT executives as strategic partners in the organization. 

Here’s a rundown of the tech trends in focus this year…

Computing Power

We are in mid-2022 and computing power will continue to explode. If we look at the existing infrastructure, we now have considerably better cloud infrastructure, and many businesses are working on the cloud. Additionally 5G is being rolled out, and 6G is on the horizon. That means even more power in our phones, in our cars, and in our wearable devices.

Computing power is definitely on a rise!

Cyber security Mesh

Cyber security mesh is a flexible architecture that integrates widely distributed and disparate security services. It enables best-of-breed, stand-alone security solutions to work together to improve overall security while moving control points closer to the assets they’re designed to protect. It is helpful in both cloud and non-cloud environments; and can quickly and reliably verify identity, context and policy adherence.

Smarter Devices

Smarter devices are being created and the growing computer power is responsible in motivating us to create smarter devices. We now have intelligent televisions, autonomous cars, more intelligent robots that can work alongside humans to complete more tasks. Reports say that we’ll see continued momentum for this smart device explosion, including the introduction of intelligent home robots.

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

The focus everywhere is in providing advanced AI capabilities to the world. One of the key trends in the AI world is machine vision. We are sitting in 2022 and in this age we now have computers that can see and recognize objects on a video or photograph. Language processing is also making big advances, so machines can understand our voices and speak back to us. This year is seeing low-code or no-code trending. Our capabilities are now being directed towards building our AI using drag-and-drop graphical interfaces, so we can develop extraordinary applications without being limited by our coding skills.

Extended Reality

We now have more augmented reality (AR) capabilities on our devices (particularly our phones and tablets), and we're seeing an even bigger push toward virtual reality (VR). 2022, is seeing new, lighter, more portable VR devices, so instead of having clunky headsets that require Wi-Fi connections, we now focusing on devices that are more like glasses that connect to our phones and give us superior VR experiences on the go. Incredible experiences in metaverse will result with these extended reality advances.

Data Fabric

Every advance in technology indicates we have enormous amounts of data available, and data has now become the number one business asset for every organization. We can use data to better understand our customers, research key trends, and get insight into what’s working inside our organizations. Data fabric is the new trend. This provides a flexible, resilient integration of data sources across platforms and business users. This ensures the availability of data everywhere. Data fabric can reduce data management efforts by up to 70%.

Genomics

Genomics and Nanotechnology are a top trend of 2022 because these advancements are helping us to modify crops, cure and eradicate diseases, develop new vaccines like the COVID-19 shot, and other medical and biological breakthroughs. Nanotechnology will also allow us to give materials new attributes, so we can create things like bendable screens, better batteries, water-repellent, self-cleaning fabrics, and even self-repairing paint.

Quantum Computing

2022 is enabling quantum computers to fundamentally change how we approach problems like logistics, portfolio management, and drug innovations. Quantum computing is the system of processing information that is represented by special quantum states. It enables machines to handle information in a fundamentally different way from traditional computers. Quantum computing gives us computing power that is a trillion times more powerful than what we get from today’s advanced supercomputers.

Digital Trust

The buzzword today is Block chain technology. This goes go beyond Bitcoin to things like smart contracts that allow us to verify ownership with NFTs. This year, we are seeing more companies and individuals enhancing physical objects with block chain technology and tokens.

3D Printing

We can now make things with 3D printing that we would never have dreamed of a decade ago. We are seeing a transformation in manufacturing and beyond, from 3D printing technological innovations, including mass-produced customized pieces, concrete for houses, printed food, metal, and more.

New Energy Solutions

Another important trend is new energy solutions. As we tackle climate change, we are seeing continued advances in the batteries we use in our cars, as well as innovations in nuclear power and green hydrogen. New trends are continuously emerging and are allowing us to power our ships, our planes, our trains and generate energy for all.

Aptly stated by Carly Fiorina, former chief executive officer, Hewlett Packard - “The goal is to turn data into information and information into insight.”

Thus, IT leaders need to determine whether trends and disruptions are a threat or an opportunity. They can realize enterprise change by leveraging their knowledge of business and technology to understand the impact of trends on their organizations.