IDC Europe Unveils Top Technology Predictions for 2020 and Beyond

IDC announced last week its European predictions for 2020 and beyond. The predictions are focused on helping organizations understand the action plan across the critical areas of technology, leadership and value.

In the technology area, the predictions reveal which emerging technologies need to be incorporated into platforms to underpin the future enterprise. Concerning leadership, IDC talks about how will the key stakeholders of the digital dream team execute on the road map. In terms of value, predictions deal with the question how can organizations redefine value to incorporate not just financial metrics but also ecosystem and social impact elements, taking into account the ethical impact of technology on society.

IDC explained the decisions that should be made for 2020 through the lens of the CEO. The objective was to ensure that we remove the traditional IT/business/digital debate once and for all. "We created 10 game-changing predictions that we think are going to shape the market in 2020 and beyond. We highlight the future enterprise and how we need to redefine value, leadership, and technology as we move toward the future. We hope these predictions will help European enterprises to plan their 2020 strategies." said Phil Carter, chief analyst at IDC.

A closer look at IDC's top 10 predictions reveals the following:

1. Spotlight on digital capabilities: By 2022, 25% of the top 500 European companies will have at least two board members with digital business excellence capabilities.
2. Digital investments: In 2020, European organizations will spend over $271 billion on digital transformation, but only 16% will deliver new revenue streams.
3. Data collected from connected devices: By 2022, data collected from connected devices will generate a revenue opportunity of $10.5 billion for the top 500 European organizations.
4. Core modernization journey: By 2025, 60% of European organizations will modernize their core IT leveraging the cloud, resulting in a 25% business productivity improvement.
5. New technology leadership role: By 2022, 30% of European organizations will define a new technology leadership role combining CIO, CTO, CDO, and innovation functions.
6. Processes to become more intelligent: By 2023, 70% of European intelligent process automation (IPA) initiatives will be infused by AI.
7. European organizations will replace KPIs with KBIs: By 2022, 60% of the top 2,000 European organizations will replace KPIs with KBIs to accelerate employee and customer advocacy.
8. Accelerate cultural change: By 2022, a third of organizations will fail to accelerate business agility and innovation due to a copycat culture.
9. The role of the CISO: 2022 is the cut-off for CISOs to establish themselves as business leaders who can provide digital trust.
10. The ethical use of digital technologies: By 2024, 50% of European public companies will report annually on the ethical use of data, automation, and AI in their organizations.