Decoding Gartner's 2020 predictions

Gartner’s Top 10 strategic technology trends for 2020 are focused on “Smart spaces build” (Automation) with a people-centric notion (Human).

From my perspective the 10 predictions fall into 5 categories viz. Automation, AI/ML, Security, Cloudification/5G and Experience.

Cloud as a platform will be the key to driving each of these areas. Thus, complexity in building some of the solutions may reduce due to democratization, however, the build and security will have to be tackled by automation and a good DevSecOps practice. 

Definition of smart space –Physical environment in which “People and Technology-enabled systems” interact in increasingly open, connected, coordinated and intelligent ecosystems. Multiple elements including “people, processes, services and things” create a more immersive, interactive and automated experience.

The top 10 strategic technology trends for 2020 by Gartner are summarized below:

1)   Hyperautomation - “Multiple machine learning (ML) + packaged software + automation tools” to deliver work. Born from RPA but differs with ML and Packaged software combined with Automation tools.

2)   Multi-experience - Shift in perception of users to the digital world and how they interact with it. Interaction change due to conversational platforms (Alexa/Siri/Hey Google/Cortana etc.), VR, AR and mixed reality (MR). Model shift from “technology-literate people to one of people-literate technology”.

3)     Democratisation of Expertise - providing people with access to technical expertise( e.g. ML and Appdev) or business domain expertise (e.g. Sales process or economic analysis) via a radically simplified experience and without requiring extensive and costly training. Democratisation of

a.      Data and analytics (tools targeting data scientists expanding to target the professional developer community),

b.      Development (AI tools to leverage in custom-developed applications),

c.      Design (expanding on the low-code, no-code phenomena with automation of additional application development functions to empower the citizen-developer)

d.      Knowledge (non-IT professionals gaining access to tools and expert systems that empower them to exploit and apply specialised skills beyond their own expertise and training).

4)     Human Augmentation - Physical (wearable/implants) and Cognitive (Multi-experience interface).

5)     Transparency and traceability -   Organizations recognizing the risk of securing and managing personal data, and governments are implementing strict legislation to ensure they do. Transparency and traceability are critical elements to support these digital ethics and privacy needs. Focus on three areas viz. AI and ML, personal data privacy, ownership and control and ethically aligned design.

6)     The empowered edge – Edge computing while current focused on IOT, it will become a dominant factor across virtually all industries and use cases, as the edge is empowered with increasingly more sophisticated and specialised compute resources and more data storage. Complex edge devices, including robots, drones, autonomous vehicles and operational systems will accelerate this shift.

7)    Distributed cloud - Distribution of public cloud services to different locations (centralized cloud computing to distributed) , while the originating public cloud provider assumes responsibility for the operation, governance, updates to and evolution of the services.

8)     Autonomous things – are “Physical devices + AI= Automate processes”. Examples are robots, drones, autonomous vehicles/ships and appliances.

9)     Practical blockchain – Reduction in transaction costs, asset tracking and identity management. Events like goods received can trigger payment.

10)  AI security – There can be a massive increase in potential points of attack with IoT, cloud computing, micro-services and highly connected systems in smart spaces. Focuse should be on protecting AI-powered systems, use AI to enhance security defence, and anticipating nefarious use of AI by attackers.