There appears to be some substance behind the big data hype, with ambitious organisations increasing their investments from the year previous.

According to a Gartner survey of IT and business executives, big data investments in 2013 continue to rise, with 64 percent of business investing or planning to invest in big data technology compared with 58 percent last year.

"The hype around big data continues to drive increased investment and attention, but there is real substance behind the hype," says Lisa Kart, research director, Gartner.

"Our survey underlines the fact that organisations across industries and geographies see 'opportunity' and real business value rather than the 'smoke and mirrors' with which hypes usually come."

The survey, of 720 Gartner Research Circle members worldwide, found that of the 64 percent of companies investing or planning to invest in big data technology in 2013, 30 percent have already invested in big data technology, 19 percent plan to invest within the next year, and an additional 15 percent plan to invest within two years.

Industries leading big data investments in 2013 are media and communications, banking, and services, with thirty-nine percent of media firms said already investing, followed by 34 percent of banks and 32 percent of services firms.

Planned investments during the next two years are highest for transportation (50 percent), healthcare (41 percent) and insurance (40 percent). However, every vertical industry again shows big data investment and planned investment according to the results.

Geography not a factor

Regardless of geography, the analyst firm claims investment typically has different stages that organisations go through, starting with knowledge gathering, followed by strategy setting.

The investment is small, and mostly consists of time. Then it is typically followed by an experiment or proof of concept. Still, the investment is small and tentative.

Then, after completing a successful pilot, the first deployments take place. Here the investment curve rises. Over time, business operations start to rely on the deployments, and the investments move from implementing systems to managing them.

"For big data, 2013 is the year of experimentation and early deployment," says Frank Buytendijk, research vice president, Gartner.

"Adoption is still at the early stages with less than eight percent of all respondents indicating their organisation has deployed big data solutions.

"Twenty percent are piloting and experimenting, 18 percent are developing a strategy, 19 percent are knowledge gathering, while the remainder has no plans or don't know."

Challenges

But just as priorities are changing, Gartner observes that big data challenges shift with organisational maturity in information management, especially handling big data.

Businesses are struggling most this year with knowing how to get value from big data according to the survey, compared with last year's top challenge of governance issues.

"It is interesting to note that understanding 'what is big data' is the top challenge for 15 percent of organisations," says Nick Huedecker, research director, Gartner.

"Perhaps unsurprisingly, this concern came mainly from respondents with 'no plans to invest.'

"Organisations should be sure they are educated about big data opportunities in their industry to ensure they are not missing the boat."

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