architecture & technology strategy

The National Retail Federation’s Big Show attracted tens of thousands of attendees . Far from resigning themselves to conquest by market places they are determined to make the right investments to thrive and survive. Three years ago we found retail CIOs most concerned about innovation and security https://www.forrester.com/report/The+Retail+CIO+Agenda+2015+Secure+And+Innovate/-/E-RES121188 At the NRF show in 2018 it […]

A new crop of emerging technology stands poised to unleash another cycle of raised consumer expectations, changing behaviors, and disruption. The stakes for business leaders are high — a wrong investment could put your firm out of business; make the right move and you’ll vault over your competitors.   Which tech should you bet on? Which […]

This Year’s Winning EA Initiatives, Brought To You By Forrester And Infoworld, Drive The Customer-Obsessed Digital Business Any enterprise architects worth their salt can tell you how strategic enterprise architecture is, but the fact is that most EA programs struggle. The problem? Getting the enterprise to act strategically in the face of the need for […]

In five years you’ll be using Insight PaaS for big data in the public cloud. On-premise won’t be an option. Here is why. Cloud Is The Hottest Market For Big Data Technology The shift to the cloud for big data is on. In fact, global spending on big data solutions via cloud subscriptions will grow […]

Do you wonder what other organizations are working on?  Do you feel challenged around topics such as DevOps, hybrid cloud, infrastructure transformations and how to enable your workforce?   I took a look at 1,270 user inquiries/questions that the Forrester’s I&O research team received between April 1, 2016, and March 31, 2017.  The results are: Financial […]

This morning, Adobe announced that it will end support for the Flash Player at the end of 2020. Over the past 20 years, digital firms have used Flash content for everything from clickable ads to games to interactive learning and rich internet applications. When I started at Forrester in 2006, Flash ran neck and neck […]

The rise of mobile networks, improved wireless tech, and rapid sensor innovation over the past 10 years has enabled companies to use internet-connected sensors and actuators to improve business operations and transform products. The ever-increasing number of connected devices is opening up new business models and new opportunities for both tech vendors and end users; […]

Predictive analytics has become the key to helping businesses — especially those in the highly dynamic Chinese market — create differentiated, individualized customer experiences and make better decisions. Enterprise architecture professionals must take a customer-oriented approach to developing their predictive analytics strategy and architecture. I’ve recently published two reports focusing on how to architect predictive analytics capability. […]

My colleague Henry Baltazar and I have been watching the development of new systems and storage technology for years now, and each of us has been trumpeting in our own way the future potential of new non-volatile memory technology (NVM) to not only provide a major leap for current flash-based storage technology but to trigger […]

Banks and other types of firms in financial services typically like to know the answer to the question: “What are the others doing?” They leverage the answer when, for example, assessing their overall strategic position, planning for the transformation of their application landscape to a more powerful customer-centric approach, or determining the “best” sourcing approach […]

The bank I mainly use for my daily banking needs does not offer that many examples of great customer experiences. The two reasons why my family continues to use that bank are the high number of ATMs in the area where we live and a very customer-oriented branch advisor. Our most recent interaction with that […]

When my teenage son is interested in purchasing a mobile phone, some PC equipment, or a games console, he will typically spend weeks gathering the necessary information to arrive at a well-informed decision. He once told me that he feels this is necessary to make the best use of his savings — a trait that […]

Forrester’s latest survey on financial services architecture shows that financial services firms in general, and banks in particular, put a high priority on a few selected topics (see the figure below). Our banking-specific research for AD&D professionals has focused on topics like banking architecture, banking platforms including core banking, Internet and mobile banking (to be […]

Standardized IT systems can appear to make a lot of sense – standardization can be cost efficient, aligned with industry approaches and can help promote re-use.  However, the business advantages standardization yields can be easily replicated by competitors.  So what are the trade-offs and when does it make sense to choose standardization? Standardization is typically […]

A number of Forrester analysts from the Asia Pacific region attended the recent SAP analyst event in Singapore. Meetings with SAP global and regional executives and a large number of detailed breakout sessions over the 1½-day event all clearly indicate that SAP is continuing to try and reposition itself as a true generalized application platform […]

HP seems to be on a tear, bouncing from litigation with one of its historically strongest partners to multiple CEOs in the last few years, continued layoffs, and a recent massive write-down of its EDS purchase. And, as we learned last week, the circus has not left town. The latest “oops” is an $8.8 billion […]

During the past decade, I have worked with many analyst relations (AR) people as well as specialist AR firms. I have never blogged about them in the past, and I have no intention to do so in the future. Earlier this week, however, I saw that an employee of one of the specialist AR firms […]

When designing application infrastructure strategy, planning for the renewal of their application landscape, or assessing their overall strategic position, banks and other types of firms in financial services typically like to know the answer to the question: “What are the others doing?” Source: November 8, 2010, “Financial Services Firms Again Seek To Renew Their Application […]

Some people say that the old Maya calendar predicts that the world will end in the year 2012. Will this happen? Most likely no. Without judging anybody’s beliefs in this ancient calendar: Some experts say that the Maya calendar is like a five-digit odometer in your car: When it reaches 99,999 kilometers or miles, it […]