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The flow of data through, around, and between enterprises keeps getting faster and deeper, but many organizations seem be drowning-rather than reveling-in it. This flood of data brings many issues.
Managing, storing, and classifying the information is one challenge. Figuring out what's of material importance to the business is another. Then, there's the fact that most companies still only leverage a relatively small portion of their data to better serve customers, understand markets, and improve operations.
This challenge is borne out in a survey of 241 IT and data decision makers by Unisphere Research, in which the vast majority of respondents said that a well-documented data strategy is critical to their ability to deliver value to the business. At the same time, virtually all departments in the enterprise are demanding innovation from data, with outward-facing departments such as line-of-business owners and marketing leading the way, and inward-facing departments such as HR, warehousing, and manufacturing the least demanding. Planning is also being impacted by the need to reduce costs, eliminate data silos for better reporting, and facilitate advanced analytics leveraging technologies such as machine learning or AI ("Profiling the Data-Driven Business, 2019").
Close to half of the enterprises in the survey are aggressively planning for realtime data capabilities to further enhance their data platforms. Forty-nine percent see real-time (sub-second) analytics, not just real-time ingestion, as a vital...