Top 10 Strategic Technology Trends for 2018

Gartner highlighted the top strategic technology trends that will impact most organizations in 2018. They define a strategic technology trend as one with substantial disruptive potential that is beginning to break out of an emerging state into broader impact and use, or which are rapidly growing trends with a high degree of volatility reaching tipping points over the next five years.

"Gartner's top 10 strategic technology trends for 2018 tie into the Intelligent Digital Mesh. The intelligent digital mesh is a foundation for future digital business and ecosystems," said David Cearley, vice president and Gartner Fellow. "IT leaders must factor these technology trends into their innovation strategies or risk losing ground to those that do.

The first three strategic technology trends explore how artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are seeping into virtually everything and represent a major battleground for technology providers over the next five years. The next four trends focus on blending the digital and physical worlds to create an immersive, digitally enhanced environment. The last three refer to exploiting connections between an expanding set of people and businesses, as well as devices, content and services to deliver digital business outcomes.

The top 10 strategic technology trends for 2018 are:

1. AI Foundation
2. Intelligent Apps and Analytics
3. Intelligent Things
4. Digital Twin
5. Cloud to the Edge
6. Conversational Platforms
7. Immersive Experience
8. Blockchain
9. Event Driven
10. Continuous Adaptive Risk and Trust