42% of IT Leaders Have Invested in Big Data – Gartner

After a few years of experimentation and early adopter successes, 2013
will be the year of larger scale adoption of big data technologies,
according to Gartner, Inc.

According to a worldwide survey of IT leaders, 42% of respondents stated
they had invested in big data technology, or were planning to do so
within a year.

"Organizations have increased their understanding of what big data is
and how it could transform the business in novel ways. The new key
questions have shifted to ‘What are the strategies and skills required?’
and ‘How can we measure and ensure our return on investment?’" said Doug Laney, research VP at Gartner. "Most
organizations are still in the early stages, and few have thought
through an enterprise approach or realized the profound impact that big
data will have on their infrastructure, organizations and industries."

Organizations are undertaking their big data initiatives in a rapidly
shifting technological landscape with disruptive forces that produce and
demand new data types and new kinds of information processing. They
turn to big data technology for two reasons: necessity and conviction.
Organizations are becoming aware that big data initiatives are critical
because they have identified obvious or potential business opportunities
that cannot be met with traditional data sources, technologies or
practices. In addition, media hype is often backed with rousing use
cases.

"This makes IT and business leaders worry that they are behind
competitors in launching their big data initiatives. Not to worry, ideas
and opportunities at this time are boundless, and some of the biggest
big data ideas come from adopting and adapting ideas from other
industries," said Frank Buytendijk, research VP at Gartner. "Still,
this makes it challenging to cut through the hype when evaluating big
data technologies, approaches and project alternatives."

Despite these challenges, Gartner predicts that by 2015, 20% of Global
1000 organizations will have established a strategic focus on
‘information infrastructure’ equal to that of application management.

In anticipation of big data opportunities, organizations across
industries are provisionally collecting and storing a burgeoning amount
of operational, public, commercial and social data. Yet in most
industries – especially government, manufacturing and education –
combining these sources with existing underutilized ‘dark data’ such as
emails, multimedia and other enterprise content often represents the
most immediate opportunity to transform businesses.

Gartner believes that by integrating and analyzing a variety of data
sources, not just individually, organizations can achieve the most
extraordinary business insights, process optimization and, of course,
decision making. Although most of the big data hype is about handling
the sheer size and speed of data available, our research shows that the
ultimate wins will be from those making sense of the broadening range of
data sources.

"Business and IT executives regularly say that information is one of their company’s greatest assets," said Laney. "Businesses
are increasingly managing and deploying information more effectively
than ever, but certainly not with the well-honed asset management
discipline applied to their traditional material, financial or other
intangible assets. The application of formal information valuation
models will allow IT, information management and business leaders to
make better-informed decisions on information management (IM),
enrichment, security, risks, purchasing, collection, usage, bartering,
productization and disposal."

Additional information is available in the Gartner Special Report Big Data, Bigger Opportunities: Investing in Information and Analytics.
The report can be viewed at  and includes links to reports and video
commentary that examine the impact of big data on enterprises.

Laney will provide additional analysis during the Gartner webinar, Big Data and Analytics Strategy Essentials on March 26.