Data management and integration demands continue to increase as organizations are faced with more data flowing in from a greater variety sources than ever before. At the same time, there is the need to extract business value, protect, and offer wider access to that data for more users. Today, being data-driven is the goal of all companies, whether long established or born digital.
The Experian “2020 Global data management research” report found that nearly everyone understands the importance of data related to customer insight, business operations, and digital transformation. Being data-driven is perceived to enable improved customer experience, identified by 50% of respondents, better insight for decision making (45%), and allow more innovation (44%).
However, according to the ‘Big Data and AI Executive Survey 2020’ from NewVantage Partners, only 37.8% of respondents have thus far created a data-driven organization. And only 26.8% say they have had success at building a data culture within their firms.
A key enabler of data-driven approaches are cloud services, which can offer modernization, flexibility, elasticity, and cost-saving benefits while opening the door to new technologies. However, with the use of multiple cloud and on-prem platforms, the complexity increases, creating the need to address data movement and analytics requirements. Along with these hybrid and multi-cloud approaches and a trend toward polyglot persistence in data management systems, there are newer products infused with AI, machine learning, or automation to improve processes. The result is that there is no shortage of options to help organizations reach their data-driven goals.
To help make the process of identifying useful products and services easier, each year Database Trends and Applications magazine presents a list of Trend-Setting Products. These products, platforms, and services range from widely accepted offerings that continue to evolve to meet the needs of their loyal constituents to breakthrough technologies that are in the early stages of adoption. However, the common denominator for all is that they represent a commitment to innovation and seek to provide organizations with tools to address changing market requirements.
Beyond the list, we encourage you to continue your exploration of these products by visiting the companies’ websites for more information. In addition, in this issue, we include Product Spotlight articles penned by company executives that highlight the features that make their products unique.