The research and advisory firm, Gartner, has identified top trends expected to impact technology and service providers by 2024. These revolve around areas such as efficient growth for high tech, evolving enterprise IT-provider relationships, sustainability, AI safety, rising buyer pessimism, industry-focused generative AI models, personalised marketplace experiences, industry cloud growth, and more.
Generative AI (GenAI) has emerged as a dominant aspect of the technical and product agenda for tech providers, according to Eric Hunter, Managing Vice President at Gartner. By reshaping tech providers from their growth and product strategies down to the tools used daily by their associates, GenAI presents a new landscape.
He noted, "Despite the potential for GenAI to reshape providers, it is not the only influence facing technology leaders. There are new points of friction in growth plans, new points of fusion in marketing and sales, and new relationships opening up to technology and service providers.”
The firm identified efficient growth for high tech as a notable trend. With significant growth in IT spending over the last decade, high-tech firms have pursued growth strategies without fully considering the costs, leading to a "growth at all costs" strategy. As changing macroeconomic conditions create uncertainty and shift investor focus towards margin growth, Gartner analysts are noting a trend towards efficient growth strategies.
Existing business and technical demands are causing enterprise IT to cover more ground at a deeper level and faster pace, thereby eroding their capacity and capabilities. This scenario points towards the creation of new relationships and revenue opportunities for tech providers across enterprise IT.
Sustainability initiatives are evolving, moving beyond merely mitigating internal risk and ensuring compliance. Emerging technologies can provide holistic leverage for sustainability objectives, and product leaders must embrace these, considering factors such as responsible AI and AI safety.
Gartner's report also highlights an increase in buyer pessimism, which has negatively impacted sales pipelines over the past three years. Technology providers will need to adapt their sales and marketing approaches to effectively address this change in buyer behaviour. Furthermore, the need for industry-focused GenAI models is becoming critical for enterprise use cases that need domain-specific data.
Other significant trends flagged by Gartner were the growth in the industry cloud with more tech providers utilising industry cloud platforms for service delivery and the emergence of specialised digital marketplaces offering personalised buyer experiences. The significance of product-led-growth (PLG), integrating value management with realisation initiatives in hybrid go-to-market strategies, and precision marketing and sales that leverage technological advances like GenAI, digital buying, and the metaverse were also noted.