The year 2014 was marked by a number of potentially historic technological innovations. From Europe taking the front seat in the driverless car industry, to wearable technology – whether it is smart spectacles or connected watches – finally becoming mainstream, 2014 has seen technologies first conceptualised in science fiction start to become reality. And with the Middle East having a reputation for being an early adopter of new technologies, there’s no doubt that the region will embrace these innovations at the same time as other developed nations across the globe.
All these innovative technologies will be reliant on seamless connectivity and in this scenario the network will gain more prominence and be looked upon as an integral and critical part of the overall solution. As 2014 draws to a close, the question is: What can we expect in 2015?
Below Yarob Sakhnini, Regional Director, MEMA at Brocade outlines his predictions on what technology trends in the Middle East to watch for in 2015:
1) The rise of the New IP: As businesses and consumers are increasingly embracing cloud, mobile and social technologies, enterprises and service providers need to have agile networks that have the capability of quickly adapting to customer demand and enable the rapid delivery of services. Traditional legacy IP networks are static and unresponsive. We are moving into an era of user-centric networking infrastructure that can massively scale to handle the mobile data boom, cloud services explosion, big data analytics burst and Internet of Things. In 2015, we will see this begin in earnest, with the rise of the New IP, a new networking paradigm that is better aligned with the evolution of the rest of IT – and increasingly open, software-driven, and user-centric.
2) Growing momentum in SDN and NFV with Open Standards gaining popularity: The industry recognises that in order to truly align an enterprise’s infrastructure strategy with its business requirements, customers must be free to choose the solutions that best meet their specific needs, regardless of vendor – which requires Open Standards. With truly open, interoperable standards finding favour and customers opting for greater choice and flexibility, Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) will really take hold and forward thinking organizations in the Middle East, will start actual trials and adoption.
3) Virtualised workspaces will become more mainstream:Mobile technologies are disrupting our traditional work patterns to such a degree that soon the term ‘office’ will become obsolete. IDC has predicted that 1.3 billion people will work remotely using mobile technology in 2015, equivalent to 37.2 percent of the entire global workforce. Virtualized workspaces offer an opportunity for employees to have the same working experience regardless of their location or device, giving them greater freedom that, in turn, improves productivity for the business. However, this added flexibility will inevitably put greater strain on core IT infrastructure, and companies will need to make sure they have the right network in place in order to deliver this level of user flexibility and freedom.
4) The Internet of Things will start to impact business: With Gartner predicting that 26 billion connected units – from watches to refrigerators and treadmills to cars – are expected to be installed by 2020, businesses will need to cope with an ever-growing network of connected devices generating and accessing data. Many of these connected technologies will be brought on to existing corporate or public networks, making investment in the underlying infrastructure that supports these advancements absolutely essential.
5) A new approach to privacy: With public awareness of data security and privacy increasingly, every organization will need to sharpen its privacy and data security initiatives. 2014 has exposed many concerns around data privacy and, with “privacy-first” services such as Snapchat, Whisper, and Ello growing in popularity, it is clear that this trend is here to stay. Data breaches or leaks are no longer simply security issues; they are potentially hugely damaging to a company’s brand and reputation. As a result, organisations will need to pay much closer attention to how and where they store sensitive commercial or customer data. Investment in education for employees and customers will be particularly critical as access to, and use of, data becomes a fundamental issue for every business.
