October 17 - 21, in Orlando
ORLANDO, Fla., October 20, 2005 - The growing practice of introducing new technologies into consumer markets prior to industrial markets will be the most significant trend affecting information technology (IT) during the next 10 years, according to Gartner, Inc. As a result, the majority of new technologies enterprises adopt for their information systems between 2007 and 2012 will have roots in consumer applications.
The large scale, high-volume unit production, and potential profit opportunities available to leaders in consumer markets have convinced many leading IT vendors to focus more resources and innovation on consumer products and services during IT industry's slow recovery from the dot-com collapse. As technology providers increasingly design products for consumers, enterprise IT managers have to learn how to manage these products as employees bring them into varieties of workflows and processes. Gartner analysts discussed the consumerization of IT at Gartner Symposium/ITxpo, which is taking place here through October 21.
"Consumer IT will affect every enterprise" said David Mitchell Smith, vice president and Gartner Fellow. "Attempts by enterprises to deny this are doomed to failure, just as previous attempts to deny Wi-Fi, 'smart' mobile phones, the Internet and even the PC itself failed."
Lower cost, consumer-grade technology represents an unavoidable challenge for the CIO, but it is also an opportunity if savvy choices are made about where and when to enable and support its deployment.
"As perceptive CIOs seek to transform their rigid, legacy-ridden infrastructures into agile, efficient, service-driven delivery mechanisms, they must adopt a pragmatic approach to managing the risk of consumer IT while embracing the benefits," said Steve Prentice, vice president and research director at Gartner.