A Big Data Approach
In the age of digital transformation, enterprises need informative access to its 360-degree data — right down to micro levels, in both structured and unstructured form.
Apart from the conventional ERP data that flows within the ‘settled down’ ecosystem, disparate data sources especially from social media platforms have immense influence on enterprise businesses.
It brings the opportunity to find answers to many business-relevant, predictive questions.
Brand positioning, product visibility, customer sentiment, competition’s market approach etc are just a few of them.
Such data is ‘Big Data’.
Big data, if not used in critical decision making, is a mistake, especially in fast-changing business scenarios. Therefore, every enterprise must plan for in-house capability building at the earliest, including technology and manpower.
The provisioning of technology needs substantial CAPEX of course, and this could pose as a constraint. Nonetheless, there are emerging technologies, mostly open source-based, that could help.
To handle such massive data volumes, a very stable storage system, massive memory and fast-processing servers are a must. Such infrastructure could again be quite expensive. And in-house capabilities are sometimes a challenge.
The solution is perhaps cloud services, which allow the comfort of an OPEX model, with adequate flexibility and elasticity.
It could also be a good idea to partner with OEMs. Be it public or private, Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IAAS) is now an accepted economic model for cloud partners, enterprises and OEMs.
Finally, a hybrid approach has many advantages: Enterprises continue enjoying on-premise infra advantage, with less dependency on connectivity for many critical business applications — at the least cost-and-time commitment.
Hybrid is the model to adopt while addressing many non-core business points of an enterprise. Hand over the headache of infra sustenance to the right people, whose core business interest brings value to your business bottom lines.
A true win-win for all.
(Note: The views expressed here are solely those of the author in his private capacity and may not represent the views of the Company.)
