2024 Emerging Data Trends - Staying on Top!

Data's ever-increasing dominance is a clear signal of its high-impact influence across various industries and processes. As we find ourselves halfway through 2023, it's crucial to contemplate what the next 18 months might hold in store for data management platforms. I strongly believe that, as we near toward 2024, many companies will arrive at a pivotal crossroads, recognising the key necessity of harnessing data with intelligence – it’s now or never people!

In order to thrive and stay ahead of the curve, organisations must embrace pivotal data management trends that will chart the course towards success. New technologies are readily available and if you’re not already embracing them for strategic considerations then you are already falling behind.

Among the trends on the horizon, I've handpicked a few favourites that promise to reshape the digital landscape – as always, I'm keen to hear your thoughts on them.

1. Pioneering Data Democratisation with Fabrics & Mesh

Data democratisation, the practice of making data accessible to all within an organisation, irrespective of their technical proficiency, has gained significant traction recently – I touched on this briefly last week on a LinkedIn post. Innovations such as data fabrics and mesh, exemplified by platforms like ThoughtSpot, Domino Data Lab, K2view, and others, have played a pivotal role in democratising data.

A data fabric represents a data management architecture that harmoniously integrates data from diverse sources into a unified, easily accessible view. Simultaneously, mesh empowers domain experts, granting them greater control over their data while enhancing data quality and governance. These architectures are instrumental in ensuring data democratisation by providing swift access, facilitating faster decision-making, and guaranteeing improved data quality and security through centralised access control and repositories.

2. Embracing Industry 4.0 Technologies for Data Insights

Industry 4.0, synonymous with the fourth industrial revolution, leverages automation, data analytics, and artificial intelligence to forge smart factories. Data analytics, a cornerstone of Industry 4.0, offers immense potential to enhance efficiency, productivity, and quality by identifying optimisation opportunities and preventing defects.

Consider, for instance, how data analytics can predict machine failures, allowing for proactive maintenance and minimising downtime. This technology is not limited to manufacturing; it's growing at a staggering CAGR of 16.3% from 2023 to 2030, potentially valuing the industry at a staggering USD 377 billion.

3. Elevating GDPR Compliance through Data Masking

Data masking is a crucial strategy for safeguarding the privacy of customers and employees while mitigating the risk of data breaches. It involves redacting sensitive data from datasets used in analytics and machine learning, preventing GDPR violations such as profiling or targeted marketing.

Data masking can produce pseudonymised datasets, where personal data is replaced with artificial identifiers, bolstering privacy protection. K2View stands out for its comprehensive data masking solutions, including redaction, tokenisation, de-identification, pseudonymisation, and data obfuscation, ensuring compliance with data privacy regulations like GDPR, CCPA, and HIPAA.

4. The Emergence of DataOps

DataOps, a methodology streamlining data collection, preparation, analysis, and delivery, is gaining traction across industries. By prioritising cross-functional collaboration, automation, version control, and continuous integration and delivery, DataOps addresses common data team challenges like data silos, prolonged development cycles, and lack of agility.

Automated data pipelines and standardised processes ensure consistent data validation, cleansing, and transformation, enhancing the accuracy and reliability of derived insights. Traditional data management approaches often grapple with bottlenecks and delays, while DataOps, with its emphasis on automation and continuous integration, empowers organisations to iterate rapidly, deliver insights promptly, and facilitate swift decision-making.

One thing is clear: organisations MUST prepare for the imminent data revolution. As data's significance continues to soar, businesses that proactively adapt and capitalise on emerging trends will secure a significant competitive edge. Technologies that were once reserved for select enterprises will become accessible to SMEs, further driven by the integration of AI. The future beckons—are you ready for it?

Do share your thoughts in the comments and let me know if there’s anything else you’d add?

If you want to know more about how to gain competitive advantage in your industry by securing and retaining the top 5% of data talent, feel free to drop me a message and I’d be happy to chat.

Thanks so much for reading,

Drew – Data Talent Sourcing Partner