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2012 Will be the Year of Mobile and Cloud Platform Battles: IDC

Spending on mobile computing, cloud services, social networking, and big data analytics technologies is growing at about 18% per year and, according to IDC, it is expected to account for at least 80% of IT spending growth by 2020. IDC predicts that 2012 will see some of the first high-stakes battles as IT vendors strive to achieve dominance in these highly important and rapidly growing technology areas. According to IDC’s chief analyst Frank Gens, by the end of 2012 it should be clear which vendors will be among the industry leaders at the end of the decade.

IDC forecasts that worldwide IT spending will reach $1.8 trillion in 2012, 20% of which will be driven by smartphones, media tablets, mobile networks, social networking, and big data analytics. 2012 will also be a year of Mobile Ascendency, the research firm says, as mobile devices will exceed PCs in both shipments and spending. In the next year, mobility market will see heated competition as Microsoft joins the battle for leadership in the mobile OS market and Amazon’s Kindle Fire challenges the iPad in the tablet market.

2012 will also see intense competition in the cloud computing space, as the strategic focus shifts from building infrastructure to the development of application platforms and ecosystems. IDC says that established players like IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle are facing serious challenges from Amazon, Google, Salesforce.com, and VMware. The research firm also expects a number of mergers and acquisitions in 2012 as these companies seek to gain a competitive edge.

Social networking technologies will be recognized as a mandatory component in every major enterprise IT vendors’ strategy. IDC expects a number of major IT vendors to make “statement” acquisitions in social business while others continue to expand their community platforms. Companies like LinkedIn, Spigit, BrightIdea, Attensity, and Lithium are logical acquisition targets for Microsoft, IBM, and Oracle.

Big Data will become the “must have” competency in 2012 as the volume of digital content grows to 2.7 zettabytes (ZB), up 48% from 2011. Over 90% of this information will be unstructured and challenging to understand and analyze. IDC expects to see offerings that integrate data and analytics technologies move into the mainstream. 2012 is likely to be a year of Big Data-driven mergers and acquisitions as large IT vendors seek to acquire additional functionality.

IDC’s predictions for 2012 are presented in full detail in the report, IDC Predictions 2012: Competing for 2020 .

 

SOURCE: IDC