企业信息技术领域七大趋势

刘颖

Worlds created entirely of clouds. “Unicorns” racing through new landscapes. Data moving faster than the speed of light.

For those of you who don’t work in enterprise technology, this may sound like a fantasy world—or a little like the latest Star Wars movie. But based on my experience as an enterprise-tech investor, first at Intel Capital and now at Battery Ventures, I predict a few of these far-fetched scenarios could become reality in 2016. Here’s a closer look at seven enterprise-tech trends I believe will hit their stride in the coming year.

1.2016 will be an M&A bonanza.


The recent merger agreement between Dell and EMC was just the start of a consolidation tidal wave I expect to see next year in enterprise IT, where top companies like Cisco Systems CSCO 0.96% , Dell, IBM and others command a combined market capitalization north of $1 trillion. They are now locked in a battle with many startups for $300 billion of annual IT spending worldwide that, according to Gartner, is ripe for disruption. These startups operate in hot areas such as cloud computing, big data, next-generation storage and open-source technology. The incumbents are in serious jeopardy, and many will need to take dramatic steps to stay competitive.


Progressive blue chips will recognize this new state of affairs and aggressively get into the acquisitions game to catch up with Amazon Web Services (AWS), the current king of cloud computing. The number-two player, Microsoft MSFT 0.95% , could supercharge its hybrid- cloud play by purchasing a private-cloud leader such as Red Hat RHT 0.56% . This sort of move could help Microsoft capture some of the hundreds of billions of dollars in datacenter spending now shifting to the cloud. Google GOOG 0.30% , under new SVP Diane Greene’s leadership, will get serious about enterprise and cloud and could buy Mesos or Docker to attract “Web scale” workloads from huge Internet companies like Pinterest and Airbnb; IBM IBM 1.79% could take the lead in private cloud computing by acquiring an Openstack market leader.

2. AWS is just getting started.

Related to #1, 2016 is the year that enterprise tech will wholeheartedly embrace the public and hybrid cloud. Because of this, AWS is going to experience another record year — on top of the impressive 80% growth it logged during Q2 2015. This division of Amazon AMZN -0.20% could, in fact, become the fastest-growing, multi-billion dollar company in the entire history of enterprise infrastructure. And since CIOs dislike vendor lock-in, the agnostic Microsoft Azure won’t be far behind in signing up new customers, staying firmly entrenched in second place.

3. Open-source software is eating the world – but where’s the money?

Open source will become standard for infrastructure software in 2016, with CIOs adopting an open-source, software-first approach. Early open-source market leaders that have gone mainstream will split into two camps: those that have clear monetization models—like Cloudera*, MongoDB*, Elastic, Datastax, and Mirantis*—and those that have millions of downloads but no revenue to show for it. Some of the more financially savvy startups in the first category are likely to go public next year, forming a strong foundation for more open-source businesses to enter the public markets in coming years.

4. Unicorns and bloodied “unicorpses” will face off.


Next year will reveal the differences between unicorns (private startups whose values exceed $1 billion) and unicorpses (former unicorns whose value has slipped under $1 billion). The tech IPO market’s lackluster performance is already putting pressure on late-stage growth financings, and this new landscape will force many unicorns to make some tough choices.

Fast-growing enterprise companies with strong fundamentals will bite the bullet and bravely go public, even if they have to accept lower valuations than those recorded in their last private rounds – something that happened already with companies like Pure Storage PSTG 1.19% and New Relic NEWR 1.78% . I believe companies like these will choose to focus on long-term equity value creation, post-IPO, as has been the case with companies like Tableau DATA 4.65% and Splunk* SPLK -0.17% .


In contrast, ex-unicorn companies that spent extravagantly on their businesses could be forced to consider down-rounds or sale options to stay in the game. Note: Don’t confuse the ability to raise money with the desire to spend it!

5. Fast data is just as important as big data.


For years now, big data has been all the rage, but it’s no longer sufficient. With data velocity on the rise, companies must be able to rapidly analyze big data and get sound, actionable advice instantaneously. This will help them better service customers and also bolster their bottom lines. I predict new technologies like Storm and Spark Streaming will be fully embraced by the market in 2016, and we’ll witness the emergence of a new class of real-time applications in e-commerce and financial technology services powered by super-speedy data analytics. “Fast data” is the second iteration of big data, and it will create a lot of value.

6. Security 2.0: Machine learning can beat sophisticated hackers.


This year, you could barely go a day without hearing about yet another security hack at a major corporation or government agency. In 2016, I believe we’ll see the emergence of a new class of security solutions that attempt to outsmart hackers. How? By using “machine learning,” a field of computer science that leverages pattern recognition to extract malicious intent and make predictions about future exploits. The first wave of this trend was highlighted by Splunk’sacquisition earlier this year of Caspida, which uses machine-learning technology to ferret out cyber threats, and the $25 million raised in September by Exabeam, a big-data security analytics company. But in 2016 I predict we’ll see machine learning used more broadly to keep up with, and even pre-empt, sophisticated cyber attacks.



7. The West will look East (not China!) for business opportunities.

With more than 352 million Internet users and counting, India’s mobile and Web-scale ecosystem will become a large marketplace for U.S.-based, enterprise software companies. Indian shopping sites Snapdeal and Flipkart, and transit app Ola Cabs, now represent significant sales opportunity for these startups, similar to what we experienced in the U.S. with enterprise companies selling to Pinterest, LinkedIn LNKD 0.45% and Twitter TWTR 1.90% — only the Indian opportunity could be much larger and grow at a faster pace. And with no legacy infrastructure competing for attention, India could be a significant driver for overall industry cloud and analytics spending.

Overall, enterprise-tech startups have immense power to shape and move many industries, but they can’t go at it alone. By working together with well-established companies to further the adoption of open-source software, fast data and cloud computing, we’ll uncover even more new business opportunities— and create strong services that aren’t fantasy, but reality.

刘颖

独角兽”将在全新领域大展拳脚，而数据流动的速度比光还快。
对于企业技术领域的局外人来说，这听起来像是天方夜谭，或是有点像最新一部《星球大战》电影。但作为企业技术领域的一位资深投资者，我曾在英特尔投资、Battery Ventures服务过，我预计一些看似异想天开的预测将在2016年成为现实。现在让我们更细致地观察企业技术领域在新的一年里有望出现的七大趋势。

1.2016年将出现企业并购热潮

我认为，戴尔和EMC最近的并购协议，只是企业技术领域合并浪潮的开端。在这一规模超过1万亿美元的市场，思科系统、戴尔和IBM等公司占据了统治地位。为了争夺全球每年3000亿美元的信息技术投入，这些顶级公司正在与越来越多的初创公司展开殊死竞争。高德纳公司表示，企业技术行业的颠覆时机已经成熟。在云计算、大数据、新一代存储技术和开源技术等热门领域，大批初创公司不断涌现。旧有的大公司如今处在严重的危机中，许多公司需要采取激烈举措才能维持竞争力。

认识到这种新形势的蓝筹股公司或将积极地展开并购，以追赶当今云计算领域的王者——亚马逊云服务(AWS)。第二大巨头微软有可能通过收购红帽公司等私有云领域的佼佼者，来加强它在混合云领域的优势。鉴于用于数据中心的数千亿美元资金开始流向云领域，这种举措可以帮助微软从中分得一大杯羹。另一方面，在新任高级副总裁戴安妮•格林的领导下，谷歌也开始重视企业技术和云服务业务。这家搜索巨头可能会通过收购Mesos或Docker公司，来吸引Pinterest和Airbnb等大型互联网公司“全网规模”的数据负荷。IBM有可能收购Openstack市场的领先企业，以期在私人云计算方面占得先机。

2.亚马逊云服务只是刚刚开始

与第一条相关，2016年是企业技术领域彻底接受公共云和混合云的一年。正因如此，继2015年第二季度达成令人惊叹的80%增长率之后，亚马逊云服务将在新的一年再创佳绩。事实上，这家亚马逊分公司有可能成为整个企业基础设施历史上增长最快，价值数十亿美元的公司。另外，由于首席信息官反感厂商捆绑服务，Microsoft Azure在吸引新客户方面也不会落后太多，将稳居第二位。

3.开源软件正在吞食世界——不过怎么从中赚钱？

开源将在2016年成为基础软件的标准，各公司的首席信息官将接受源代码开放、软件为先的策略。早期开源市场的领导者成为主流以后，将分为两派——一种有着明确的盈利模式，例如Cloudera*、MongoDB*、Elastic、Datastax和Mirantis*，另一种空有数百万下载量，却没有收入。第一类中那些更具经济头脑的初创公司可能会在明年上市，为更多开源公司在未来几年上市奠定坚实的基础。

4.独角兽和“前独角兽”将正面交锋

独角兽（估值超过10亿美元的私人初创公司）和前独角兽（估值下滑至10亿美元以下的初创公司）的差距将在明年见分晓。科技公司首次公开募股后乏善可陈的市场表现，已经给后期发展融资带来了压力，这种新情况会迫使许多独角兽做出艰难的选择。

基础雄厚、发展迅猛的企业将咬紧牙关，勇敢上市，即使他们不得不接受低于最后一轮私人募资的估值——Pure Storage 和New Relic等公司已经出现了这种情况。我相信这类公司会选择专注于创造长期的股权价值，重视上市后的表现，Tableau和Splunk*等公司就是这么做的。

相反，前独角兽公司已经在他们的业务上一掷千金，于是不得不考虑缩小规模或是出售公司，以避免出局。注意：不要把募资能力和花钱水平混为一谈！

5.快数据与大数据一样重要

多年来，大数据一直十分流行，不过光是大数据已经不够了。随着数据速度的增加，公司必须迅速分析大数据，立刻获取可靠、可执行的建议。这能帮助他们更好地服务客户，支撑公司的盈利。我预计，Storm和Spark Streaming等新技术将在2016年被市场完全接受，电子商务和金融技术服务领域还将涌现出一批采用高速数据分析方法的实时应用。“快数据”是大数据的二次迭代，它将创造大量价值。

6.安全2.0：机器学习可以击败经验丰富的黑客

今年，你几乎每天都能听到某家大型企业或政府机构遭到黑客袭击的新闻。而在2016年，我认为将有阻挡黑客的全新安全解决方案面世。怎么阻挡？利用“机器学习”。这个计算机科学新领域将利用模式识别来寻找恶意目的，预测未来的漏洞。在今年早些时候，Splunk收购了使用机器学习技术搜寻网络威胁的Caspida公司，这一趋势由此获得关注。今年9月份，大数据安全分析公司Exabeam也募得了多达2500万美元资金。预计在2016年，机器学习会得到更广泛的应用，以应对甚至提前预防复杂的网络攻击。

7.西方将在东方（不是中国！）寻求商业机遇

印度的互联网用户已经超过3.52亿人，并且还在持续增加。该国的移动和网络级生态系统，将成为美国企业软件公司的巨大市场。对于这些初创公司来说，印度购物网站Snapdeal，Flipkart，以及打车应用Ola Cabs，现在代表着巨大的销售机遇。这类似于美国企业软件公司过去将产品卖给Pinterest、LinkedIn和Twitter的情形，只不过印度可能蕴含着更大的机遇，更快的增长速度。由于没有当地的基础软件参与竞争，印度有可能显著驱动整个行业的云服务和数据分析开支。

总体来说，企业技术初创公司拥有巨大的力量来塑造和改变许多行业，但他们无法独自实现这一点。通过与现有巨头合作，扩大开源软件、快数据和云计算的应用，我们将发现更多的商业机遇，创造出并非幻想，而是真实存在的强大服务。