Predictions 2024: Technology Infrastructure Addresses A Tumultuous Environment

We are in the midst of Forrester’s Predictions season, when analysts curate a set of predictions for the coming year focused on various technology categories. As 2024 approaches, there are signs of economic turbulence. Forrester believes, however, that companies will turn to technology as a key business differentiator. This year, Forrester’s technology-focused analysts developed the inaugural technology infrastructure Predictions report highlighting key predictions for 2024.

Dynamic changes are occurring in the technology infrastructure landscape, driven by shifts in business requirements that impact the data center, remote work, edge environments, and connectivity. Firms are deploying infrastructure to bring technology, services, and workloads closer to where they can serve their customers optimally. In addition, artificial intelligence technology is raising business expectations, and security issues must be addressed across this diverse infrastructure landscape. Given this dynamic environment, we have provided a preview of three technology infrastructure predictions for 2024 below:

• Limited chip availability will drive common sense and taper down AI expectations. The mad dash for AI has demand for GPUs and related chip production at its limits. With constrained capacity to make more of these chips, AI processing will hit a wall in 2024. This shortage will most acutely affect large buyers such as cloud providers. Expect a pragmatic approach to AI, driven by availability, silicon economics, and sustainability. More modest, smaller-scale enterprise applications should not be impacted. Technology providers like Dell and HPE will partner with chipmakers like NVIDIA and Intel to power these enterprise applications.
• Twenty percent of VMware enterprise customers will escape the VMware stack. The impending acquisition of VMware by Broadcom has cast a shadow on an already beleaguered VMware customer base. Many are exhausted by significant price hikes, degrading support, and mandatory subscription to software bundles in which some modules such as NSX and Aria Suite/vRealize Suite end up as shelfware. Subsequently, many of VMware’s enterprise clients are exploring alternatives to its virtualization, cloud management, end user computing, and hyperconverged infrastructure products despite the company’s dominance in these technologies. In 2024, Forrester predicts that 20% will begin their escape.
• Half of all new data centers will explore heat reuse. Data centers use roughly 1 to 1.3% of global final energy consumption. Germany is debating a new law, the Energy Efficiency Act, that would require public authorities, corporations, and data centers to use less energy through practices such as heat reuse. Many believe that this is the first of many global laws in this regard. Heat reuse means utilizing excess heat from servers to serve energy demands outside the data center. In 2024, data center builders will preemptively invest in this practice to reduce cost and meet their own carbon commitments in anticipation of this new wave of legislation.

Will 2024 be easy for technology teams? Probably not. Tech leaders must step up to the challenge of delivering technology infrastructure that addresses the evolving requirements of customers and employees.

Read our full Predictions 2024: Technology Infrastructure report to get more details about each of these three predictions, plus additional bonus predictions. You can also set up a Forrester guidance session to discuss these predictions further.

If you aren’t yet a client, you can download our complimentary Predictions guide, which covers our top predictions for 2024. You can also access additional complimentary resources, including webinars, on the Predictions 2024 hub.