2018 is expected to be the year in which disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence and natural language processing, among others, will mature and become ideas to introduce in companies, to be fundamental tools for business .
Health technology
In early 2018, Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase announced a technology-focused joint venture, through which they intend to offer their employees and family members simplified, high-quality, and transparent health care at a cost Reasonable.
Some analysts see that progress is already being made in preventive care. The technology market research firm ABI predicts that, throughout 2018 companies will adopt remote patient monitoring, with 18 million portable devices incorporated into corporate wellness programs. The firm predicts that number will reach 44 million by 2021.
Video, video conferencing and VR
In a survey of nearly 300 companies by MIT to determine what makes the employee experience excellent, researchers discovered a surprise in the highest results, the videos. According to researchers, investments in video technology lead to innovation as well as better collaboration and productivity. Kristine Dery, researcher at MIT’s Sloan Center for Information Systems Research said:
“We see companies investing significantly in interactive video technologies, especially when they spread the use of agile methodology beyond their software development teams to the rest of the business. This agile and interactive method of project delivery, with daily stand-ups, requires teams to be face-to-face, or to have the technologies that replicate those most intimate situations as close as possible.”
Research conducted by MIT predicts that video technology will continue to simulate and improve face-to-face communication with new features, such as virtual reality (VR) and other immersive technologies, especially as organizations work to fill the skills gap with distributed teams.
Chatbots
Customer service is an area where digital transformation is moving, for better or worse, at a breakneck pace. Gartner predicts that more than 85% of the customer service centers will be operated by bots by 2020. As Scott Zoldi, head of analysis at FICO, says:
“In 2018, chatbots will quickly become more sophisticated, drastically reducing the costs of routine customer service activities and often improving the customer experience. In the coming year, chatbots will quickly understand the highest-value tone, content, and conversation paths predicted to meet a variety of goals.”
But this technology will not only be used for customer support, but will range from banking chats to devices like Amazon Echo and Google Home. Banks like NatWest have started using chatbos to communicate with customers instead of using the phone. West Yorkshire police were the first force to make use of this technology, using Amazon Alexa to provide information to residents with less ability to reach it. And it is that law enforcement can also make use of technology to help prevent crime.
Artificial intelligence for services
Neil Sahota, a world leader in business development and chief inventor of the IBM Watson group, says this year we’ll see AI move forward in leaps and bounds in industries as varied as real estate, law and hospitality:
“As more guests demand always-on and personalized concierge service, hotels are activating chatbots to create virtual concierges that can help with any request in a timely manner. By remembering and processing tons of information ranging from the nearest restaurant recommendations to tomorrow’s weather, AI can help developers create bots that fit each guest’s preferences. In addition, robots allow guests to interact with the hotel from any location via their mobile devices”
Hotels like Marriott International and Cosmopolitan Las Vegas have already started implementing bot concierge services, and more hotels will be getting on the car in 2018.
A survey of 6,500 executives around the world by Accenture Labs and Accenture Research shows that the majority (81%) of executives believe that, over the next two years, artificial intelligence will work alongside humans in their organizations such as co-workers, collaborators and trusted advisors. On the other hand, McKinsey Global Institute estimates that in 60% of the occupations, they could be automated globally. The report states that AI can transform some business activities and has the potential to fundamentally change others.
Iot
A recent CompTIA report finds that IoT devices are helping to reduce costs and improve efficiency in industrial environments. Research predicts that by 2020, an interconnected network of sensors, devices and related technologies will generate more than $1.9 trillion globally.
While increased IoT adoption will also bring great benefits, and thereby need ingesced companies to work together with IT groups to identify risks and provide broad Protection.
Voice control and virtual assistants
2018 is a year where natural language processing will be substantially improved and entrenched in companies. This is a trend that will continue as workers who grew up with voice control integrated with cloud computing enter the workforce.
Christian Pedersen, Product Manager at S/ 4HANA Cloud at SAP says:
“Voice-activated assistants have already begun to permeate the business environment, but it’s still too early to harness the power this technology can offer. Now you start to see examples of the demand and need for these technologies, such as with the announcement of Alexa for Business at the end of the year.”
Immersive Experiences (RA, RV, Mixed Reality)
Research firm Gartner hopes that next year augmented reality (AR), virtual reality and mixed reality will be used by 20% large companies.
Gartner predicts that RA will outperform virtual reality for commercial use. Technology will evolve from pilot projects with modest growth to sustainable business models, with market maturity and global availability.
On the other hand, according to a report by Accenture company, four out of five (87%) executives believe it will be important to leverage virtual and augmented reality to close the physical distance gap when customers are related and Employees.
Smart manufacturing
Research firm ABI identifies intelligent manufacturing as a transformative technology to consider. Ultimately, the goal is to create an experience where information can be accessed right where the work is done.
Meanwhile, industrial 3D printing, for prototypes and parts that are created on the fly, is on the rise, AND ABI expects $20 billion in 3D printed products and parts in the US by 2026.
The journey of customers
With the hustle and bustle around autonomous vehicles and smart stores like Amazon Go, computer vision is having its moment.
According to Eli Portnoy, CEO of research and intelligence firm Sense360:
“The strategy of tracking customer journeys has moved from the online marketplace to physical stores. The proliferation of cheaper and more generally available sensors and advances in artificial intelligence are creating a variety of new applications. While companies like Amazon have been monitoring and recording our shopping habits and preferences for some time, physical stores seek to mimic that record of customer activity to remain competitive.”
FedEx and other large companies have installed pilot prototypes of this technology, while new companies such as the Shipping company Peloton are building it from scratch.
Containers and microservices
Containers and microservices are attracting the interest of organizations that need to rapidly develop applications, especially those that use IoT and/or the cloud.
Todd Loeppke, architect and chief technology officer at Sungard AS says:
“It’s interesting to see IoT projects that influence many technologies such as edge computing, serverless and containers, along with organizational structures across DevOps and microservices”
As organizations become more comfortable managing these modern container-based microservices architectures, there will be continued growth. Because, many organizations will support container orchestration platforms such as Docker, Kubernetes, or Cloud Foundry, which help manage the lifecycle of containers as they grow their use.
Blockchain
Amit Zavery, senior vice president of product development at Oracle Cloud Platform, says blockchain’s effect is being seen outside the financial industry, in areas such as supply chain improvement and security.
And that is that more than 2,500 new blockchain related patents have already been introduced. While a financial impact of $176 billion is expected by 2025.
Vincent Manier, Chief Financial Officer of Engie Insight, says we’ll see a major disruption in the finance departments of companies expanding beyond accounting:
“It is crucial for CFOs not only to closely examine the external disruption that blockchain will launch, but also to prepare for the impact on their internal financial organizations. Everything from reconciliation and cash application to order and invoice agreement could soon be assumed by a distributed accounting technology.”
Cloud computing
The combination of cloud and edge technology delivers the benefits of computing power, with the ability to host, manipulate, and analyze transferred data.
While it is common to assume that cloud and edge computing is competitive approaches, it is a fundamental misunderstanding of concepts, according to a Gartner report, companies should start using edge design patterns in their architectures Infrastructure.
Similar to cloud computing, edge computing stores all data in one place, but simply pushes it to the edge of the device rather than the cloud. This can help make faster decisions and enables better infrastructure communication by filtering out what’s important in real time. Compared to cloud computing, this method makes it much easier to perform real-time actions and analogies and increases the efficiency of devices such as autonomous vehicles.
