Does siloed data negatively impact your organization?

Many companies are struggling to make data accessible and get value from it, with 68 percent of respondents reporting siloed data negatively impacts their organization, according to the new Syncsort survey.

The top IT initiatives respondents identified for 2019 were Cloud/Hybrid Computing (46%), Modernizing Infrastructure (38%) and Data Governance (32%), followed by Advanced/Predictive Analytics (25%).

IT professions were split on top challenges, with the largest group selecting the Skills/Staff Shortage (38%), but Data Governance (33%), Making Data More Accessible (33%), Keeping Data Up-To-Date (30%) and Budget Constraints (30%) closely followed.

IT grappling with data delivery & value

• Only nine percent of respondents called their organization “Very Effective” at getting value from data, while nearly half (48%) responded just “Somewhat Effective”
• Making data accessible to users across the enterprise was the third most cited IT challenge, and only half (50%) called their organization “Very Effective” or “Somewhat Effective” in getting data insights to business users
• Despite this, “Improved Access to Data” fell fourth on the list of business initiatives IT indicated they would support in 2019, behind Increased Operational/Workforce Efficiency (48%), Improved Customer Experience (46%) and Cost Reduction (42%)

Organizations still modernizing infrastructure & building data lakes

• Modernizing Infrastructure was the second highest priority IT initiative for 2019, selected by 38 percent, and was the top technology currently providing business benefits, chosen by 25 percent – the largest group – of respondents
• Just nine percent are in Mature Adoption (5+ years) with Data Lakes while 17 percent are In Production (2-4 years), 24 percent in Early Adoption (less than 2 years) and 23 percent still in the Research/Evaluation stage
• Most building Data Lakes are populating them from their Enterprise Data Warehouse (52%), with a lower percentage using data from RDBMS (37%), NoSQL Databases (24%), Third-party Providers (23%) and Cloud Repositories (21%)
• The Data Lake use cases with the most interest were Advanced/Predictive Analytics (50%), Real-time analytics (42%), Operational Analytics (41%), Data Discovery and Visualization (39%)

Companies still evaluating emerging technologies, while cloud implementations mature

• Cloud/Hybrid Computing was the top IT initiative for 2019, selected by 46 percent, with 39 percent already in Early Adoption (less than 2 years), 27 percent In Production (2-5 years) and 10 percent in Mature Adoption (5+ years)
• Blockchain (34%), IoT (32%), AI (30%) and Streaming Data Technology (24%) had the largest number of respondents still in Research/Evaluation, but early adopters show traction for these technologies
• For organizations investing in Blockchain, 20 percent are in Early Adoption, seven percent In Production and five percent in Mature Adoption
• For organizations investing in AI/Machine Learning, 20 percent are in Early Adoption, 12 percent In Production and seven percent in Mature Adoption
• For organizations investing in Streaming Data Technology, 22 percent are in Early Adoption, 15 percent In Production and nine percent in Mature Adoption

“There is so much data being produced today, and it’s creating a significant number of new opportunities and challenges,” said Tendü Yoğurtçu, CTO, Syncsort.

“We are seeing cloud and hybrid cloud as the mainstream trends, which is consistent with the results of our 2018 cloud survey. With the gravity of data shifting, organizations are trying to take advantage of the cloud’s elasticity and gain the ability to analyze and deliver trusted data into application pipelines as quickly as possible. These are the precursors to improving data accessibility and taking advantage of the emerging technologies, like machine learning and streaming analytics, that will help deliver more value out of data.”