As we step into 2022, it is time to focus on the next big trends that are coming our way. The pace of the global Digital Transformation shows no signs of slowing down, and we decided to list some of the hot tendencies that are going to shape the growth of businesses.  

Cloud-Native Platforms 

This will not surprise you since it has been at the forefront for many years now. With the exponential rise in the adoption of cloud-native technologies, predictions show that more than 35% of all apps will be cloud-native by the end of 2022. Leaders, such as ServiceNow, focus on low-code solutions for the rapid development of applications consisting of user interfaces, business logic, workflow, and data services. 

They allow you to build new architectures that are resilient, elastic, and agile — enabling you to increase the velocity of your business and respond to the rapid changes in the digital world. 

The focus of lift-and-shift cloud migrations is to take the legacy workloads and place them in the cloud. Leveraging the core elasticity and scalability of cloud computing, cloud-native platforms deliver faster time to value, scalability, and reduced costs to the bottom line. They free up time to focus on application functionality by reducing dependencies on infrastructure. 

AI and Automation

Realizing the full potential of Artificial Intelligence, AI will come to the forefront of the conversation in 2022 for businesses. It is expected to become more ubiquitous in the everyday lives of both employees and customers with the impact it can bring to data analytics enabling organizations to solve problems faster and at scale, make better predictions and gain a competitive advantage as a result. Sundar Pichai, Chief Executive of Google even stated that “Artificial intelligence will have a more profound impact on humanity than fire, electricity and the internet.” 

Despite the elevated expectations, merely adopting AI is simply not enough for businesses. According to the “AI: BUILT TO SCALE” research, 84% of C-suite executives believe they must leverage artificial intelligence (AI) to achieve their growth objectives and 76% say they struggle to scale it across the enterprise. Businesses must create a sole source of truth by breaking down silos across the enterprise. Machine learning and data analytics will be vital in understanding all the data for enhanced decision-making. 

In 2022, 3 big AI waves are expected to emerge: 

• Embedded AI – AI-first approach embedded at the core of all business processes and infrastructure from architecture to operations 
• Responsible AI – AI led by principles such as fairness and transparency, and turned into consistent practices, demanded by some regulated verticals 
• Creative AI – With the recent steps towards legal recognition and protection of products created by AI, creativity might not be considered as human only trait anymore 

A hybrid model of work

We already have shared some thoughts on this topic in one of our articles, and it seems it will be even more relevant in 2022. The massive change organizations underwent in the last two years enabled the rise of the hybrid workplace. Something that was unthinkable a couple of years ago now is shaping the future of work. Business leaders have to adopt the best approach for their companies to meet the employees’ expectations and retain talents. Those who leverage the Digital Transformation tools and automation and create the needed seamless collaboration between the teams will increase productivity and overall performance regardless of the physical location of their team members. 

According to a survey, done by MuleSoft, top automation priorities for 2022 include: improving operational efficiency (54%), improving productivity (49%), and creating better-connected experiences (41%). 

Now that the expectations towards the software and hardware tools for interactive digital communication are rising with every second, 2022 is again going to be a big year for all the leaders and innovators in this area. All big competitors, such as Zoom, Google, Microsoft, Salesforce, etc., have made announcements for changes in their platforms. According to the “State of the Global Video Conferencing Devices Market, Forecast to 2025” conducted by Frost & Sullivan, the global market is expected to reach revenue of $7.71 billion by 2025, compared to $2.75 billion in 2020, representing a tremendous growth opportunity driven by the long-term, sustainable demand for video meetings to connect remote workers and geographically dispersed teams.

Cybersecurity Mesh

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic and the rise of the hybrid work model of work, the business world was rife with cybersecurity disruptions ranging from incidents to cyberattacks. 

Cybersecurity mesh is a cyber defense strategy that uses a comprehensive approach and independently secures each device with its own perimeter – such as firewalls and network protection tools. The traditional security perimeter can no longer cover all the business assets due to the new ways of working. That requires cybersecurity to be redefined with а decentralized identity around a person or thing. The common integrated structure secures all assets, regardless of location, to enable a security approach that extends across the foundation of IT services. 

A plausible use of such technology will be beneficial in many ways from better identification of incidents to quicker response time. Gartner prognoses that by 2024, organizations will reduce the financial impact of security incidents by an average of 90% by adopting a cybersecurity mesh architecture. 

Composable Business

How well can your enterprise respond to disruptive changes? The era of event‑driven architectures and composable businesses has started and it is in the companies’ hands to take place as leaders or stay in the back and become obsolete.  

Back in our childhood, we loved to build different things from interchangeable small Lego blocks. The end goal was to create a new model each time and the variations were limitless. Now let us take that example and put it in a business perspective and add some requirements. This is Business Composability.  

It is not a new term and a lot of companies have already applied some of the principles regardless of if they are doing it intentionally or not. The composable approach applies modularity to any business asset — people, processes, technologies, and even physical assets — so that leaders can quickly, easily, and safely reorganize them and create new value in response to disruption. 

The idea of composable business operates on four basic principles: 

• Discovery allowing more speed
• Modularity bringing greater agility 
• Orchestration enabling stronger leadership  
• Autonomy shaping resilient business 

In contrast with traditional thinking, the composable approach focuses on agility, values rapid responsiveness to environmental change, and enables multiple outcomes simultaneously to improve customer experience and increase loyalty.

Conclusion

Organizations that lean into the new technologies and innovations are more likely to succeed in delivering the scale and pace needed to achieve business goals. How those trends will evolve and what kind of new ones will arise on the tech horizon, 2022 has yet to show.  

Learn more insights about Digital Transformation in our blog.