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What are the emerging technology trends worth watching in 2021?

The pace of digital transformation across businesses is continuously stimulating. The rapidly evolving technology landscape is driving faster change and progress. These emerging technologies are paving the way for businesses to implement and drive innovation. Now as businesses are shifting from the fourth industrial revolution to the fifth, they have become so used to the fast pace of innovation. Coming fast on the heels of disruption, there are various emerging technologies coming ahead to the next phase of innovation. 2021 will mark the disruptive year where business leaders will require to respond to digital acceleration and be part of the change.

IndustryWired has listed the 10 emerging technology trends responsible for driving innovation in 2021.

Artificial Intelligence

AI has already gained a lot of buzz over the years and continues to be the 21st century’s disruptive technology. It is already being used in image and speech recognition, navigation apps, smartphone personal assistants, ride-hailing apps, and much more. Artificial intelligence is revolutionizing healthcare, marketing, banking, manufacturing, retail, and others. 

It is predicted that the global AI market will reach US$190 billion by 2025, with global spending on cognitive and artificial intelligence systems reaching over US$57 billion in 2021.

Blockchain

Blockchain is the most valuable technology, especially for any sort of transaction. It promises more for any process that comprises data tracking between two or more parties i.e., trading, supply chain, logistics, and provenance. Looking at blockchain trends for 2021 and beyond, the global blockchain market is expected to grow exponentially, reaching from US$3 billion in 2020 to US$39.7 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 67.3%. 

Robotic Process Automation

Today, RPA has moved beyond completely digital processes using only structured data to other processes. Companies like Microsoft and UiPath are creating deep integrations with cognitive computing systems such as text analytics, sentiment analysis, NLP, image and optical character recognition. RPA significantly automates repetitive, tedious, and menial tasks that people used to do. It is imperatively useful in financial services.

Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality

AR and VR technologies are a red-hot topic in software development for the academic, gaming, and entertainment industries. Virtual reality typically immerses the user in a virtual environment whereas augmented reality enhances their environment. With these technologies’ increasing adoption, the global AR and VR market is forecast to be valued at US$209.2 billion by 2022.

Hybrid Cloud

Every business these days is shifting to cloud architecture for seamless data accessibility and scalability from anywhere at any time. Hybrid cloud can enhance cloud migration experience by merging both public and private cloud platforms and on-premise proprietary systems. Many businesses realize its potential and have transitioned their additional workloads to the cloud using a hybrid cloud model. A hybrid cloud model can make a massive difference with cost savings and flexibility. By 2021, the hybrid cloud market will reach US$97.6 billion, up from US$44.6 billion in 2018 to, growing at a CAGR of 17.0%.

Internet of Things

The Internet of Things (IoT) is one of the promising technologies. It has already enabled smart devices, home appliances, autonomous vehicles, and others, to be connected to and exchange data over the Internet. Its application is relentlessly expanding with each passing day. For example, in healthcare, from telemedicine to automated home assistance for the elderly and disabled, IoT technologies such as sensors, smart wearables, and connected devices will continue to change healthcare delivery.

Cybersecurity Mesh

Cybersecurity is one of the tech trends that will see a significant rise in its demand and popularity in the coming years. Companies in 2021 are expected to accelerate their spending on cybersecurity. Cybersecurity mesh refers to an emerging tech trend that caters to the surging needs of cybersecurity in modern enterprises. It will support more than 50 percent of identity and access management (IAM) requests.

5G

5G is the fifth-generation cellular network technology. 2021 seems to be the brightest year for 5G. Many countries are set to begin their 5G journeys. In India, Reliance Jio plans to launch its 5G network in the second half of 2021. The launch of 5G will likely provide an opportunity for 5G infrastructure vendors and 5G smartphone OEMs to gain share with cost-conscious offerings that utilize technologies like Open RAN.

Distributed Cloud

The distributed cloud refers to the distribution of public cloud services to various physical locations, while the operation, governance, updates, and evolution of the services are the responsibility of the originating public cloud provider. It is the application of cloud computing to interconnect data and applications served from multiple geographic locations. The distributed cloud can be helpful in fulfilling the service requirements from the individual cloud locations separately rather than providing them with a centralized solution.

Quantum Computing

Quantum Computing has been around for a while but has gained massive popularity in its demand in recent years. Quantum computers tap directly into an inconceivably vast fabric of reality for fast computation. Instead of storing information using bits, 0s, or 1s, as conventional digital computers do, quantum computers use quantum bits, or qubits, to encode information as 0s, 1s, or both at the same time.