Worldwide spending on artificial intelligence (AI) systems is forecast to reach $35.8 billion in 2019, an increase of 44 percent over the amount spent in 2018,  International Data Corporation (IDC) forecasts.

Vendor revenue in the worldwide enterprise storage systems market increased 7.4 percent year-over-year to $14.5 billion during the fourth quarter of 2018 (4Q18), according to new research from International Data Corp. (IDC). Total capacity shipments were up 1.7 percent year over year to 92.5 exabytes during the quarter.

A whopping 3.5 trillion business Application-to-Person (A2P) and messages will be delivered by 2023, up from an estimated 2.5 trillion in 2019, a 40 percent rate a.new study from Juniper Research has found that that the rich media interactivity of Rich Communications Suite (RCS) would make the emerging messaging technology popular for retail and marketing business use cases.

The availability of real-time analytics is driving new and enhanced services in many industries as organizations leverage the ability to contextualize experiences for customers in real-time.

Thirty-seven percent of service leaders are either piloting or using artificial intelligence (AI) bots and virtual customer assistants (VCAs), and 67 percent of those leaders believe they are high-value tools in the contact center, according to a recent survey by Gartner, Inc. In recent years, no other channel technology has piqued customer service and support leaders’ interest more than AI bots and VCAs, according to Gartner’s Technology Roadmap Survey.

Gartner, Inc. has identified seven emerging security and risk management trends that will impact security, privacy and risk leaders in the longer term. The IT consultancy defines “top” trends as ongoing strategic shifts in the security ecosystem that are not yet widely recognized but are expected to have broad industry impact and significant potential for disruption.

The role of Hybrid LTE solutions that support fixed broadband services to the home took center stage at the recent 2019 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona as network service providers (NSPs) grapple will be explored in great detail.

The number of devices relying on Wi-Fi access within the home is exploding. Along with the increase of devices, rising streaming needs are also creating conditions where Network Service Providers (NSPs) must focus on improving Wi-Fi connectivity within the home in order to provide the highest quality of experience subscribers expect.

A new study from Juniper Research found that contactless ticketing users will reach 468 million by 2023, up from an estimated 180 million in 2019. Consequently, 1 in 4 digital tickets purchased in 2023 will be contactless.

More than 13 percent of internet users surveyed across the Australia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, India, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States had access to a smart speaker in their households in November 2018. Smart speaker penetration ranges from 6 percent in Japan, to 21 percent in the United States, according to business information provider IHS Markit.

Revenue from the sale of Artificial Intelligence (AI) chipsets for edge inference and inference training will grow at 65 percent and 137 percent respectively between 2018 and 2023, creating massive new potential revenue streams for chip vendors, according to ABI Research.

CFOs seeking to bolster their organizations’ recession preparedness should start by assessing their deal pipelines, testing the speed of their team’s financial analysis and ensuring their balance sheets can support countercyclical investments, according to Gartner, Inc.

The arrival in 2019 of 5G wireless wide-area networking technology promises to leave an indelible mark on any industry that stands to gain from the rapid evolution of the Internet of Things (IoT), and will place network service providers in an ideal position to serve this market.

A new study from Juniper Research has found that there will be 8 billion digital voice assistants in use by 2023, up from an estimated 2.5 billion at the end of 2018.

Amazon (AWS), Google, IBM, Microsoft (Azurea) and Alibaba were named “leaders” by IHS  Markit's new scorecard on off-premises cloud IT service providers.
“Leadership in the cloud IT infrastructure services market requires a diverse portfolio, and all of the leaders have strong brand awareness and a reputation of innovation,” said Devan Adams, principal analyst, cloud and data center research practice, IHS Markit.

Emerging digital trends are top of mind for customer service and support leaders in 2019, according to a recent survey by Gartner, Inc. Customer-facing artificial intelligence (AI), big data, customer activism and rising CRM costs are key priorities for customer service and support leaders this year.

In an era of continuous change, a proactive and adaptive culture is a critical asset and CIOs will play a key role in establishing the right mindsets and practices. Gartner, Inc. predicts that by 2021, CIOs will be as responsible for culture change as chief HR officers (CHROs).

Information and communications technology (ICT) spending by service providers will reach $426 billion by 2022, representing average growth of 6 percent per year, as the ongoing shift from on-premise IT management to the "as-a-service" model continues to gather pace in many regions around the world, IDC finds.

Despite the smartphone market’s slowing growth due to saturating addressable markets, ballooning Average Selling Prices (ASPs), prevailing consumer price fatigue, and lengthening replacement cycles, all is not lost. In fact, the market will witness a 4.1 percent rise in shipments in 2019, growing to just under 1.6 billion for the year, according to ABI Research.

New research from Parks Associates finds smart speakers inspire strong brand loyalty among owners—97 percent of smart speaker households own only one brand in this device category. New research from 360 Deep Dive: Consumer Demand for High-End Entertainment Devices reveals two-thirds of smart speaker households own an Echo device, while almost one-third own a Google Home. Low-end models such as the Echo Dot and Google Home Mini are the most common products owned, but the trend of brand loyalty in this early market creates opportunities for device makers to upsell premium products.