Working with Big Data is challenging, especially when decision makers depend on market insights and intelligence from your data but don’t have quick access to it or find it unusable.
In their session at 6th Big Data Expo, Ian Khan, Global Strategic Positioning & Brand Manager at Solgenia; Zel Bianco, President, CEO and Co-Founder of Interactive Edge of Solgenia; and Ermanno Bonifazi, CEO & Founder at Solgenia, discussed how a revolutionary cloud-based BI along with mobile analytics is already changing the way organizations rely on data for decisions that affect operations as well as strategy. Also learn how combined predictive analytics, data modelling, mobile, and cloud BI are fast changing the key decision-making mechanisms in the enterprise.

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87% of enterprises believe big data analytics will redefine the competitive landscape of their industries within the next three years. 89% believe that companies that do not adopt a Big Data analytics strategy in the next year risk losing market share and momentum.

These and other key findings are from a Accenture and General Electric study published this month on how the combination of Big Data analytics and the Internet of Things (IoT) are redefining the competitive landscape of entire industries. Accenture and GE define the Industrial Internet as the use of sensor, software, machine-to-machine learning and other technologies to gather and analyze data from physical objects or other large data streams, and then use those analyses to manage operations and in some cases to offer new, valued-added services.

Big data analytics now seen as essential for competitive growth

The Industrial Internet is projected to be worth $500bn in worldwide spending by 2020, taking into account hardware, software and services sales according to Wikibon and previously published research from General Electric. This finding and others can be found on the home page of the Accenture and GE study here: How the Industrial Internet is Changing the Competitive Landscape of Industries.

The study also shows that many enterprises are investing the majority of their time in analysis (36%) and just 13% are using Big Data analytics to predict outcomes, and only 16% using their analytics applications to optimize processes and strategies. Moving beyond analysis to predictive analytics and optimization is the upside potential the majority of the C-level respondents see as essential to staying competitive in their industries in the future.

A summary of results and the methodology used are downloadable in PDF form (free, no opt in) from this link: Industrial Internet Insights Report For 2015.

Key take-aways from the study include the following:

• 73% of companies are already investing more than 20% of their overall technology budget on big data analytics, and just over two in ten are investing more than 30%. 76% of executives expect spending levels to increase. The following graphic illustrates these results:

• Big data analytics has quickly become the highest priority for aviation (61%), wind (45%) and manufacturing (42%) companies.  The following graphic provides insights into the relative level of importance of big data analytics relative to other priorities in the enterprises interviewed in the study:

• 74% of enterprises say that their main competitors are already using big data analytics to successfully differentiate their competitive strengths with clients, the media, and investors. 93% of enterprises are seeing new competitors in their market using big data analytics as a key differentiation strategy.  The single greatest risk enterprises see from not implementing a big data strategy is that competitors will gain market share at their expense.  Please see the following graphic for a comparison of the risks of not implementing big data strategy.

• 65% of enterprises are focused on monitoring assets to identify operating issues for more proactive maintenance. 58% report having capabilities such as connecting equipment to collect operating data and analyzing the data to produce insights. The following graphic provides an overview of Big Data monitoring survey results:

• Increasing profitability (60%), gaining a competitive advantage (57%) and improving environmental safety and emissions compliance (55%) are the three highest industry priorities according to the survey. The following table provides an analysis of the top business priorities by industry for the next three years with the shaded areas indicating the highest-ranked priorities by industry:

• The top three challenges enterprises face in implementing big data initiatives include the following: system barriers between departments prevent collection and correlation of data for maximum impact (36%); security concerns are impacting enterprises’ ability to implement a wide-scale big data initiative (35%); and  consolidation of disparate data and being able to use the resulting data store (29%), third. The following graphic provides an overview of the top three challenges organizations face in implementing big data initiatives:

In a perfect world, Application Performance Management (APM) has all the right elements in place, providing value to the business and IT by giving us the metrics we need and showing us the health of our applications. It alerts us to anomalies when slowdowns occur, and shows us trends on performance. But there are other elements in play that can make the operations a little smoother and our days a little brighter.

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Cloud computing has been named as one of 12 disruptive technologies which will change the relationship between the CIO and the boardroom, according to a report by Advanced 365.

The evolving role of the CIO, and the C-suite in general, has long been a feature of modern business. Opinions differ, whether it’s a wag who proclaims CIO to mean ‘career is over’, or whether it’s a report which advocates more fluency and fluidity between executives.

The Advanced 365 paper takes a look at the different types of CIO today and how it fits in to various businesses:

• CIO as manager: A CIO who delivers today, may not be as much of an ideas person but manages the business for commercial success
• CIO as leader: Engaging in and delivering change throughout the organisation, planning for tomorrow and designing new positions within the company
• CIO as entrepreneur: Dreams about the future, seeks out change and innovates against those changes to improve commercially

The conclusion with these three categories is that each boardroom needs a manager, a leader, and an entrepreneur in its deck. Not every executive will possess all these skills – Steve Jobs, for instance, one could argue is all three – but it’s about deciding which of these is best for your company’s CIO. Managers first ask ‘what?’, leaders first ask ‘how?’, and entrepreneurs first ask ‘why?’.

Boards are expecting more tech-savvy reports from their staff. A Spencer Stuart study saw that one in five boards look for directors with technology expertise. The National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD) said more than a quarter (27%) of boardrooms are unhappy with the quality of technology information they receive from below.

If we’re to accept cloud as an inexorable trend in the future – and we should, if research on enterprise cloud adoption is anything to go by – then cloud supports the ‘CIO as manager’ typology, the report argues. This is due to reducing IT costs, increasing IT agility and automating processes.

“In short, it represents a more efficient and cost effective way to run IT, which has long been the goal of the CIO as manager,” the report notes, however adding: “It could however also enable the construction of new cloud based business models and ecosystems, which ensures relevance to the CIO as leader, and especially, the CIO as entrepreneur.

“In this sense, the basic users of cloud computing is radical in impact from more advanced uses, and demands a different CIO.”

The report also notes the discrepancy between CIOs and boards, arguing the two must work more closely together if they are to gain competitive advantage from emerging technologies. Equally, CIOs need to maintain a close relationship with other C-level executives, enabling them “to better understand the operating model of the company, and be better placed to contribute tellingly to its evolution.”

The 12 disruptive technologies included in the report are cloud computing, mobile internet, automation of knowledge, Internet of Things, advanced robotics, autonomous vehicles, next generation genomics, energy storage, 3D printing, advanced materials, advanced oil and gas exploration and renewable energy. You can read the full report here.