The top trends affecting I&O teams? Gartner knows

Gartner is out with a new report that challenges infrastructure and operations (I-O) leaders to fundamentally rethink how they do their jobs.

The report, "Top 2018 Trends Impacting Digital Infrastructure and Operations" by analyst David Cappuccio, argues that an updated mindset is essential to succeed in a digital age.

But how can I-O teams get there?

Cappuccio's key insights include these recommendations:

I-O leaders focused on accelerating infrastructure innovation and agility should:

• Facilitate geoplanning by building the infrastructure required to leverage an international partner network, instead of building their own global infrastructures.
• Unify on-premises, cloud and edge architectures by leveraging APIs that connect to external ecosystems, marketplaces and communities. These APIs should integrate information systems, CRM, data and analytics, and the IoT.
• Design infrastructure that supports customer experience by focusing on issues such as network latency, simplicity of interface and rapid development.

Cappuccio also details 10 trends I-O teams must account for as they work to meet the demands of the digital future. "These are not necessarily the top 10 technologies, or the hottest trends in IT, but rather the 10 trends that we feel will have the greatest impact on I-O teams," Cappuccio writes.

We covered trends 1-4 in Part 1 of our three-part series on this report. We'll cover trends 5-7 below:

Gartner: "Customer experience is paramount, and a bad experience can have significant ramifications for a business due to the ubiquity of social media, where a negative interaction can be amplified by many orders of magnitude.

Our view:  We agree, and we believe digital experience needs to address known latency and throughput constraints caused by the combination of centralized services and distributed users.

By bringing capabilities and services close to partners and users, companies gain the ability to improve customer experience.

Take action: Read how an Interconnection Oriented Architecture (IOA) strategy brings companies globally to the digital edge and as close as possible to their people, clouds, locations and data. Simply put, an edge strategy is a strategy for high-performance.

Gartner: "In addition, as nontraditional environments (e.g., remote, edge or microDC) assume greater roles, these new realities are placing more pressure on I-O to adapt its infrastructure to fit the new environment.

Our view: The "traditional" IT environment – centralized and siloed in a corporate data center – isn't sustainable in a digital age.

It's too distant from dispersed users at the edge to meet demands for secure anytime, anywhere, any device connectivity. It's critical to have access to a global interconnection platform that connects companies wherever they need to be, whenever they need to be there.

Take action: Check out the IOA Playbook to learn how to deploy IT everywhere and securely connect to everyone that matters. This guide to implementing an interconnection-first approach to IT helps companies build the global platform they need to become a digital enterprise.

Gartner: "By taking advantage of DCaaS, IT spin up the services faster and get to new markets faster, which means that they will achieve business outcomes more quickly. However, I-O leaders need to recognize that DCaaS is not a product or cloud type. Instead, it's a view of infrastructure that can facilitate rapid and more-agile responses to the requirements of digital business.'

Our view:  Digital business today must have the ability to reach everywhere, interconnect to any service or ecosystem, and integrate everything securely.

This requires an interconnected data center platform that physically and virtually connects companies, on-demand, to whatever they need, around the world.

Take action: Download the Platform Equinix Vision Paper, which describes how one global platform brings everything into reach and enables businesses to build their digital futures. Deploying on Platform Equinix gives companies instant, secure access to interconnected ecosystems worldwide, clearing the way for collaboration, innovation and growth.

Article by Tony Bishop, Equinix Blog Network