Tech in 2024: Predictions and Wild Guesses

Wesco’s Akash Khurana on the Tech Trends He Believes Will Shape 2024

James Maguire of eWeek recently hosted a panel discussion on X titled, “Tech in 2024: Predictions and Wild Guesses.” Wesco’s Akash Khurana joined several other business technology leaders to share the tech trends he believes will shape 2024. Here are a few of his predictions:

On AI Convergence

The convergence of all things AI - platform engineering concepts, maturity in data stack and intelligent augmented applications - will be the major tech trend that shapes 2024. In the last decade there’s been a lot of progress in AI. The companies that manage that convergence well will leapfrog the ones that still believe they can be fast followers.

On AI and Government Regulation

With the launch of ChatGPT and Open AI, 2023 will go down as the year that AI went mainstream. The forces of governance and regulation are still playing catchup but will begin to play a more critical role in how AI capabilities are innovated, built, and deployed. There will be more regulation around protecting the AI investments companies make, securing their business and intellectual IP, and ensuring the capabilities that are built are able to generate value before going mainstream.

On the Cloud

Industry-specific cloud solutions and applications will take off in 2024. Whether it’s industrial, healthcare, financial services, or manufacturing, industry-specific cloud solutions are a lot closer to the domain and more tailored to the needs of the company and their business partners, suppliers, and customers.

On Cybersecurity

Cybersecurity tech has been on an upswing for the past 5-7 years and will secure the intelligent capabilities powered by cloud. This will be critical in ensuring that a company’s own data (as well as their customer’s data) isn’t compromised.

Unfortunately, the forces of good will still be fighting the will of hackers. Hackers have access to the same enhancements that large companies have in terms of AI and the cloud, and they’re focused and targeted in their efforts. Hackers continue to be part of a strong community that shares practices and capabilities.

On Enterprise Software

Enterprise systems will no longer be shackled by monolithic systems like ERP, CRMs and PLMs and, as a result, those categories will lose momentum. Gone are the days of hundreds of millions of dollars spent of ERP implementations as companies are looking for modular capabilities that can generate value sooner.

On the Platform Economy

The platform economy is a trend that will gain traction in more industries and sectors. Trends we’ve seen in the B2C environments such as Uber, DoorDash, and others are going to impact B2B in the year ahead as well. It’s not on many people’s radars but a lot of trends are pointing in that direction.

Beyond 2024

Robotics, GenAI-enabled business, enterprise applications, and leveraging data as a service will become mainstream over the next several years.