Tech Trends 2020
IN 2020, THE next stage of digital’s evolution welcomes us with the promise of emotionally intelligent interfaces and hyperintuitive cognitive capabilities that will transform business in unpredictable ways. Yet as we prepare for the coming decade of disruptive change, we would be wise to remember an important point about yesteryear’s leading-edge innovations: Architects of the 1980s designed mainframe systems that continue to run and generate business value today. Sure, they’re outmoded by today’s standards, but how many of us will build systems that run for decades? And how’s that for a legacy?
Architecting for longevity and adaptability requires a deep understanding of both today’s realities and tomorrow’s possibilities. It requires an appreciation for the technology and market forces driving change. And finally, it requires a long-term commitment to focused and incremental progress.
Against this backdrop, we present Tech Trends 2020, Deloitte’s 11th annual examination of the emerging technology trends that will affect your organization over the next 18 to 24 months. Several of this year’s trends are responses to persistent IT challenges. Others represent technology-specific dimensions of larger enterprise opportunities. All are poised to drive significant change.
We begin Tech Trends 2020 with a timely update on the nine macro technology forces we examined in last year’s report. These forces—digital experience, analytics, cloud, core modernization, risk, the business of technology, digital reality, cognitive, and blockchain—form the technology foundation upon which organizations will build the future. This year’s update takes a fresh look at enterprise adoption of these macro forces and how they’re shaping the trends that we predict will disrupt businesses over the next 18 to 24 months. We also look at three technologies that will likely become macro forces in their own right: ambient experience, exponential intelligence, and quantum.
In subsequent chapters, we discuss trends that, though grounded in today’s realities, will inform the way we work tomorrow. Our chapter on ethical technology and trust takes an in-depth look at how every aspect of an organization that is disrupted by technology becomes an opportunity to lose—or earn—the trust of customers, employees, and stakeholders. We follow with a discussion of human experience platforms that will enable tomorrow’s systems to understand context and sense human emotion to respond appropriately. Pioneering organizations are already exploring ways in which these platforms can meet the very human need for connection.
Trends evolve in unexpected ways. And often, the most interesting opportunities happen at the places where they intersect. Several of this year’s trends represent fascinating combinations of macro forces and other technology advances. For instance, digital twins represents the culmination of modernized cores, advanced cognitive models, embedded sensors, and more—a recipe that is in itself a trend, even as it builds on evolving individual technologies.
We hope Tech Trends 2020 offers the insights and inspiration you will need for the digital journey ahead. The road from today’s realities to tomorrow’s possibilities will be long and full of surprises, so dream big and architect accordingly.