3The Future of IT Infrastructure |
Executive Summary
As traditional businesses adapt to the realitiesof the new machine age – breathless time to market,
intelligently enhanced everything, meaningful and personalized experiences – the implications for
IT have been profound. It is no exaggeration to say that the core differentiator for a successful busi-
ness today rests on the readiness of its IT infrastructure – and that an infexible, sluggish, ineffcient
infrastructure poses a bigger competitive threat than any ingenious start-up or disruptive market
force.
While the legacy IT industry of servers, databases and cables is still important, it has essentially
become a utility, taking a backseat to the need for an agile, fexible and quickly scalable technology
foundation to drive business. Companies with legacy technology architectures, therefore, face a
dilemma: striking a balance between the present and future state of IT infrastructure. To achieve
this equilibrium, the frst ballast to discard is IT’s traditional obsession with cost-cutting. The simple
fact is, a lower cost but completely irrelevant backbone will condemn you to lose in whatever market
you operate in.
To learn more about the future needs of IT infrastructure, Cognizant’s Center for The Future of
Work surveyed top IT executives at leading companies around the world, the majority of which have
been in business for more than 15 years (see Appendix, page 24, for more details on the survey
methodology). Our objective was to gain insights into the changes leaders are making in their orga-
nization’s technology infrastructure, as well as the shifting nature of IT work, operations, perfor-
mance metrics and jobs to re-tool for the digital age.
Based on our fndings, we have developed a framework to help traditional businesses systematically
move toward the new way of work for IT. The framework, dubbed “HEROES,” involves change in fve
areas: hybrid cloud architectures, edge computing, robotic process automation (RPA), obsoles-
cence of old IT and enterprise security. Cutting across all fve categories is the infusion of artifcial
intelligence (AI).
Global business and technology decision makers can use our study fndings, detailed in this report,
as a practical guide to maximizing the strategic value of their IT investments. This report is intended
as a call to action that will enhance partnerships between IT and business to better manage the
transformative impact of the new machine age.
THE NEXT FIVE
YEARS WILL
DRIVE MORE
CHANGE THAN
THE PREVIOUS 50
| The Future of IT Infrastructure4
The amount of change expected in the next few years is daunting, relentless and coming fast.
Nearly 70% of the executives we surveyed agreed that their industry will change more in the next
fve years than it did in the previous 50.
Little wonder, considering phenomena like the estimated three to fve billion new consumers due
to come online from developing economies, providing a mega-surge to the global economy;1 the
number of IoT devices outnumbering the world’s population by the end of 2017;2 and perhaps
most important, the encroachment of AI into numerous entrenched societal challenges. In fact,
68% of study respondents agreed that AI will have a transformational impact on their business
by 2020.。