The top 7 tech trends for 2021: What do they have in common? - TmaxSoft
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The top 7 tech trends for 2021: What do they have in common?

Late last year, MuleSoft dug into their proprietary research and third-party sources to identify the top tech trends for 2021. There were many others, all identifying trends that were similar to MuleSoft’s. Obviously, the pandemic made a big difference in IT and technology in 2020 as digital transformation went into hyperdrive. Areas of the business that viewed cloud migrations and application modernization as “nice to haves” or something to consider for the long-term had to implement them faster than they planned to keep operating and engaging with customers.

The 2021 trends we studied reflect the natural progression from pivoting rapidly due to lockdowns and masks to determining how to move business forward with all the adjustments made in 2020. Along with being the products of turbocharged digital transformation, these trends have another thing in common. As we go through our top 7, see if you can uncover the hidden common thread. Spoiler alert: we’ll tell you the answer at the end.

Trend 1: Customer (multi)experience

In a 2020 Gartner survey, 91% of IT decision makers and executives said that customer experience was either a top or the primary goal of their digital transformation efforts. Throughout the pandemic, customers have become more dependent on their devices, using them to order grocery deliveries, choose paint colors, learn a new competency, and so on. Companies that obsess over delivering the best customer experience on all digital platforms—aka customer multiexperience--will be 2021’s winners.

Trend 2: Unprecedented data integration

Data is now the major differentiator that separates organizations from their competitors and customers and how well you unlock, analyze, and act on data will become foundational to growth. The success of modern applications is inextricably tied to data integration—and eliminating siloes will be critical in 2021. In addition, the value of data analytics used to drive the transformation of customer largely depend on the integration of all data sources—structured, unstructured, and streaming.

Trend 3: Digital culture domination

The cultures of large digital-born companies are not just for Google and Amazon anymore. In 2021, more companies than ever will be digitizing services quickly and at scale to meet rising and changing customer and user demands while uncovering new revenue channels. By the end of 2021, most companies will have established a set of values and practices that enable high performance in service of innovation and execution in a digitally enabled business environment.

Trend 4:  Digital innovation everywhere

Necessity is the mother of invention. Having to ramp up digital transformation initiatives with the same or fewer IT resources and talent meant that IT had to lessen its grip on digital innovation and let the business in. Working together, these traditionally disparate units quickly spun up unique solutions to new problems and new demands. Expect to see more of the walls between the business and IT come tumbling down as IT empowers the business to self-serve and the business guides IT through tricky business problems.

Trend 5: Composable enterprises

Responding to the pandemic and a large digital workforce has created a groundswell of applications. Building them all from scratch is no longer sustainable. Organizations are now shifting to a composable enterprise model, whereby digital capabilities can be composed of existing applications using APIs, saving time and effort. Forrester coined the concept, which we believe will be prevalent in IT by the end of this year.

Trend 6: Automation like never before

Thanks to advances such as robotic process automation (RPA), machine learning, low-code/no-code, and modern application platforms, automation has really come into its own. It is driving operational efficiency, improving business processes, and transforming software development so that more people can build applications faster. This is the year that automation will become indispensable for scaling productivity and streamlining workflows.

Trend 7: Microservices and service mesh

Organized around business capabilities, microservices structure an application as a collection of loosely coupled, testable services that can be easily maintained and are independently deployable. Their main benefit is that they help you build new customer experiences fast. As companies have discovered a need to scale, the service mesh is coming into play. A service mesh is a visible infrastructure layer that documents how different services in an app interact, so you can avoid downtime as an app grows.

The common denominator

What do all these trends share? The answer is simple: they are not compatible with legacy infrastructures and databases, aging mainframes, and decades-old business applications. From delivering frictionless experiences to RPA to microservices, to derive the most value from these trends, you need the cloud, a flexible, modern database, and an infrastructure for developing modern apps. TmaxSoft offers solutions that can help you leave the old IT structure of the past behind and embrace the new.

Learn more about how you can grow your business by modernizing your infrastructure in this eBook.

Kelly McClure is the Vice President of Global Marketing for TmaxSoft. Her 20-year marketing career spans both Fortune 1000 companies and fast growth technology startups. Kelly is responsible for leading TmaxSoft’s marketing strategy. She is experienced in aligning marketing and sales, building relevant content and messaging and developing integrated lead generation campaigns. Before joining TmaxSoft, Kelly served as the Vice President of Marketing for 10th Magnitude and held senior marketing roles with DataStax, BMC Software and Micro Focus. Kelly has a bachelor’s degree from Purdue University and an MBA from Loyola University Chicago.