The Digitization of the World
From Edge to Core
David Reinsel – John Gantz – John Rydning
An IDC White Paper – #US44413318, Sponsored by
November 2018
ANALYZE THE FUTURE
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 2
Executive Summary
This process of digitization is often referred to
as digital transformation, and it is profoundly
changing the shape of business today,
impacting companies in every industry and
consumers around the world. Digital
transformation is not about the evolution of
devices (though they will evolve), it is about
the integration of intelligent data into
everything that we do.
The data-driven world will be always on,
always tracking, always monitoring, always
listening, and always watching – because it will
be always learning. What we perceive to be
randomness will be bounded into patterns of
normality by sophisticated artificial intelligence
algorithms that will deliver the future in new
and personalized ways. Artificial intelligence
will drive even more automation into
businesses and feed processes and
engagements that will deliver new levels of
eciency and products that are tailored to
business outcomes and individual customer
preferences.
Traditional paradigms will be redefined
(like vehicle or white goods ownership) and
ethical, moral and societal norms will be
challenged as genomics and advanced DNA
profiling influence healthcare directives,
insurance premiums, and spousal choices.
Entertainment will literally be transformed
before our eyes as virtual reality technologies
transport us into new digital realities and
augmented reality will dramatically change
the service industry as we know it today.
Mankind is on a quest to
digitize the world
The data-driven world will be always on,
always tracking, always monitoring, always listening and
always watching – because it will be always learning.
The focus of this digitization is anything and everything that intersects our
business workflows and personal streams of life.
IDC predicts that
the Global Datasphere
will grow from
175 Zettabytes
by 2025
in 2018 to
33 Zettabytes
Cloud is the new core
One of the key drivers of growth in the core is
the shift to the cloud from traditional
datacenters. As companies continue to pursue
the cloud (both public and private) for data
processing needs, cloud datacenters are
becoming the new enterprise data repository.
In essence, the cloud is becoming the new core.
In 2025 IDC predicts that 49% of the world’s
stored data will reside in public cloud
environments.
Introducing the world's first data
readiness condition (DATCON) index
Not all industries are prepared for their
digitally transformed future. So, to help
companies understand their level of data
readiness, IDC developed a DATCON (DATa
readiness CONdition) index, designed to
analyze various industries regarding their own
Datasphere, level of data management, usage,
leadership, and monetization capabilities. IDC
examined four industries as part of its DATCON
analysis: financial services, manufacturing,
healthcare, and media and entertainment.
Manufacturing’s Datasphere is by far the
largest given its maturity, investment in IoT,
and 24x7 operations, and we found that
manufacturing and financial services are the
leading industries in terms of maturity, with
media and entertainment most in need of a
jump start.
China's Datasphere on pace to
becoming the largest in the world
Every geographic region has its own
Datasphere size and trajectories that are
impacted by population, digital
transformation progress, IT spend and
maturity, and many other metrics. For
example, China’s Datasphere is expected to
grow 30% on average over the next 7 years
and will be the largest Datasphere of all
regions by 2025 (compared to EMEA, APJxC,
U.S., and Rest of World) as its connected
population grows and its video surveillance
infrastructure proliferates. (APJxC includes
Asia-Pacific countries, including Japan, but
not China.)
Consumers are addicted to data,
and more of it in real-time
As companies increase the digitization of their
business and drive consistent and better
customer experiences, consumers are
embracing these personalized real-time
Data is at the heart of digital transformation,
the lifeblood of this digitization process.
Today, companies are leveraging data to
improve customer experiences, open new
markets, make employees and processes more
productive, and create new sources of
competitive advantage – working toward the
future of tomorrow.
Global Datasphere expansion is
never-ending
IDC has defined three primary locations where
digitization is happening and where digital
content is created: the core (traditional and
cloud datacenters), the edge
(enterprise-hardened infrastructure like cell
towers and branch oces), and the endpoints
(PCs, smart phones, and IoT devices). The
summation of all this data, whether it is
created, captured, or replicated, is called the
Global Datasphere, and it is experiencing
tremendous growth. IDC predicts that the
Global Datasphere will grow from 33
Zettabytes (ZB) in 2018 to 175 ZB by 2025.
To keep up with the storage demands
stemming from all this data creation, IDC
forecasts that over 22 ZB of storage capacity
must ship across all media types from 2018 to
2025, with nearly 59% of that capacity
supplied from the HDD industry.
An enterprise renaissance is on the
horizon
The enterprise is fast becoming the world's
data steward…again. In the recent past,
consumers were responsible for much of their
own data, but their reliance on and trust of
today’s cloud services, especially from
connectivity, performance, and convenience
perspectives, continues to increase while the
need to store and manage data locally
continues to decrease. Moreover, businesses
are looking to centralize data management
and delivery (e.g., online video streaming,
data analytics, data security, and privacy) as
well as to leverage data to control their
businesses and the user experience
(e.g., machine-to-machine communication,
IoT, persistent personalization profiling). The
responsibility to maintain and manage all this
consumer and business data supports the
growth in cloud provider datacenters. As a
result, the enterprise’s role as a data steward
continues to grow, and consumers are not
just allowing this, but expecting it. Beginning
in 2019, more data will be stored in the
enterprise core than in all the world's
existing endpoints.
engagements and resetting their expectations
for data delivery. As their digital world
overlaps with their physical realities, they
expect to access products and services
wherever they are, over whatever connection
they have, and on any device. They want data
in the moment, on the go, and personalized.
This places greater demand on both the edge
and the core to be able to produce the
precise data consumers require, often in
real-time. IDC predicts that due to the infusion
of data into our business workflows and
personal streams of life, that nearly 30% of
the Global Datasphere will be real-time by
2025. Enterprises looking to provide superior
customer experience and grow share must
have data infrastructures that can meet this
growth in real-time data.
Today, more than 5 billion consumers interact
with data every day – by 2025, that number
will be 6 billion, or 75% of the world's
population. In 2025, each connected person
will have at least one data interaction every
18 seconds. Many of these interactions are
because of the billions of IoT devices
connected across the globe, which are
expected to create over 90ZB of data in 2025.
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 3
Cloud is the new core
One of the key drivers of growth in the core is
the shift to the cloud from traditional
datacenters. As companies continue to pursue
the cloud (both public and private) for data
processing needs, cloud datacenters are
becoming the new enterprise data repository.
In essence, the cloud is becoming the new core.
In 2025 IDC predicts that 49% of the world’s
stored data will reside in public cloud
environments.
Introducing the world's first data
readiness condition (DATCON) index
Not all industries are prepared for their
digitally transformed future. So, to help
companies understand their level of data
readiness, IDC developed a DATCON (DATa
readiness CONdition) index, designed to
analyze various industries regarding their own
Datasphere, level of data management, usage,
leadership, and monetization capabilities. IDC
examined four industries as part of its DATCON
analysis: financial services, manufacturing,
healthcare, and media and entertainment.
Manufacturing’s Datasphere is by far the
largest given its maturity, investment in IoT,
and 24x7 operations, and we found that
manufacturing and financial services are the
leading industries in terms of maturity, with
media and entertainment most in need of a
jump start.
China's Datasphere on pace to
becoming the largest in the world
Every geographic region has its own
Datasphere size and trajectories that are
impacted by population, digital
transformation progress, IT spend and
maturity, and many other metrics. For
example, China’s Datasphere is expected to
grow 30% on average over the next 7 years
and will be the largest Datasphere of all
regions by 2025 (compared to EMEA, APJxC,
U.S., and Rest of World) as its connected
population grows and its video surveillance
infrastructure proliferates. (APJxC includes
Asia-Pacific countries, including Japan, but
not China.)
Consumers are addicted to data,
and more of it in real-time
As companies increase the digitization of their
business and drive consistent and better
customer experiences, consumers are
embracing these personalized real-time
Data is at the heart of digital transformation,
the lifeblood of this digitization process.
Today, companies are leveraging data to
improve customer experiences, open new
markets, make employees and processes more
productive, and create new sources of
competitive advantage – working toward the
future of tomorrow.
Global Datasphere expansion is
never-ending
IDC has defined three primary locations where
digitization is happening and where digital
content is created: the core (traditional and
cloud datacenters), the edge
(enterprise-hardened infrastructure like cell
towers and branch oces), and the endpoints
(PCs, smart phones, and IoT devices). The
summation of all this data, whether it is
created, captured, or replicated, is called the
Global Datasphere, and it is experiencing
tremendous growth. IDC predicts that the
Global Datasphere will grow from 33
Zettabytes (ZB) in 2018 to 175 ZB by 2025.
To keep up with the storage demands
stemming from all this data creation, IDC
forecasts that over 22 ZB of storage capacity
must ship across all media types from 2018 to
2025, with nearly 59% of that capacity
supplied from the HDD industry.
An enterprise renaissance is on the
horizon
The enterprise is fast becoming the world's
data steward…again. In the recent past,
consumers were responsible for much of their
own data, but their reliance on and trust of
today’s cloud services, especially from
connectivity, performance, and convenience
perspectives, continues to increase while the
need to store and manage data locally
continues to decrease. Moreover, businesses
are looking to centralize data management
and delivery (e.g., online video streaming,
data analytics, data security, and privacy) as
well as to leverage data to control their
businesses and the user experience
(e.g., machine-to-machine communication,
IoT, persistent personalization profiling). The
responsibility to maintain and manage all this
consumer and business data supports the
growth in cloud provider datacenters. As a
result, the enterprise’s role as a data steward
continues to grow, and consumers are not
just allowing this, but expecting it. Beginning
in 2019, more data will be stored in the
enterprise core than in all the world's
existing endpoints.
engagements and resetting their expectations
for data delivery. As their digital world
overlaps with their physical realities, they
expect to access products and services
wherever they are, over whatever connection
they have, and on any device. They want data
in the moment, on the go, and personalized.
This places greater demand on both the edge
and the core to be able to produce the
precise data consumers require, often in
real-time. IDC predicts that due to the infusion
of data into our business workflows and
personal streams of life, that nearly 30% of
the Global Datasphere will be real-time by
2025. Enterprises looking to provide superior
customer experience and grow share must
have data infrastructures that can meet this
growth in real-time data.
Today, more than 5 billion consumers interact
with data every day – by 2025, that number
will be 6 billion, or 75% of the world's
population. In 2025, each connected person
will have at least one data interaction every
18 seconds. Many of these interactions are
because of the billions of IoT devices
connected across the globe, which are
expected to create over 90ZB of data in 2025.
In 2025
IDC predicts
that
of the world’s stored
data will reside in public
cloud environments
49
%
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 4
Cloud is the new core
One of the key drivers of growth in the core is
the shift to the cloud from traditional
datacenters. As companies continue to pursue
the cloud (both public and private) for data
processing needs, cloud datacenters are
becoming the new enterprise data repository.
In essence, the cloud is becoming the new core.
In 2025 IDC predicts that 49% of the world’s
stored data will reside in public cloud
environments.
Introducing the world's first data
readiness condition (DATCON) index
Not all industries are prepared for their
digitally transformed future. So, to help
companies understand their level of data
readiness, IDC developed a DATCON (DATa
readiness CONdition) index, designed to
analyze various industries regarding their own
Datasphere, level of data management, usage,
leadership, and monetization capabilities. IDC
examined four industries as part of its DATCON
analysis: financial services, manufacturing,
healthcare, and media and entertainment.
Manufacturing’s Datasphere is by far the
largest given its maturity, investment in IoT,
and 24x7 operations, and we found that
manufacturing and financial services are the
leading industries in terms of maturity, with
media and entertainment most in need of a
jump start.
China's Datasphere on pace to
becoming the largest in the world
Every geographic region has its own
Datasphere size and trajectories that are
impacted by population, digital
transformation progress, IT spend and
maturity, and many other metrics. For
example, China’s Datasphere is expected to
grow 30% on average over the next 7 years
and will be the largest Datasphere of all
regions by 2025 (compared to EMEA, APJxC,
U.S., and Rest of World) as its connected
population grows and its video surveillance
infrastructure proliferates. (APJxC includes
Asia-Pacific countries, including Japan, but
not China.)
Consumers are addicted to data,
and more of it in real-time
As companies increase the digitization of their
business and drive consistent and better
customer experiences, consumers are
embracing these personalized real-time
Data is at the heart of digital transformation,
the lifeblood of this digitization process.
Today, companies are leveraging data to
improve customer experiences, open new
markets, make employees and processes more
productive, and create new sources of
competitive advantage – working toward the
future of tomorrow.
Global Datasphere expansion is
never-ending
IDC has defined three primary locations where
digitization is happening and where digital
content is created: the core (traditional and
cloud datacenters), the edge
(enterprise-hardened infrastructure like cell
towers and branch oces), and the endpoints
(PCs, smart phones, and IoT devices). The
summation of all this data, whether it is
created, captured, or replicated, is called the
Global Datasphere, and it is experiencing
tremendous growth. IDC predicts that the
Global Datasphere will grow from 33
Zettabytes (ZB) in 2018 to 175 ZB by 2025.
To keep up with the storage demands
stemming from all this data creation, IDC
forecasts that over 22 ZB of storage capacity
must ship across all media types from 2018 to
2025, with nearly 59% of that capacity
supplied from the HDD industry.
An enterprise renaissance is on the
horizon
The enterprise is fast becoming the world's
data steward…again. In the recent past,
consumers were responsible for much of their
own data, but their reliance on and trust of
today’s cloud services, especially from
connectivity, performance, and convenience
perspectives, continues to increase while the
need to store and manage data locally
continues to decrease. Moreover, businesses
are looking to centralize data management
and delivery (e.g., online video streaming,
data analytics, data security, and privacy) as
well as to leverage data to control their
businesses and the user experience
(e.g., machine-to-machine communication,
IoT, persistent personalization profiling). The
responsibility to maintain and manage all this
consumer and business data supports the
growth in cloud provider datacenters. As a
result, the enterprise’s role as a data steward
continues to grow, and consumers are not
just allowing this, but expecting it. Beginning
in 2019, more data will be stored in the
enterprise core than in all the world's
existing endpoints.
This study is based on IDC’s ongoing Global
DataSphere research and market sizing models.
Industry and specific geographic Datasphere
research was conducted in September 2018 by
IDC. In addition, 2,400 enterprise decision
makers were surveyed, and in-depth interviews
were conducted with senior IT executives at a
variety of industries to inform this study. The
survey was with decision makers who had
responsibility for or knowledge of their
organization’s use, management, and storage of
data leveraging advanced technologies including
Internet of Things, real-time analytics, and
AI/machine learning. The survey spanned several
countries and regions including the United
States, China, EMEA, APJxC, and others.
About this study
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 5
engagements and resetting their expectations
for data delivery. As their digital world
overlaps with their physical realities, they
expect to access products and services
wherever they are, over whatever connection
they have, and on any device. They want data
in the moment, on the go, and personalized.
This places greater demand on both the edge
and the core to be able to produce the
precise data consumers require, often in
real-time. IDC predicts that due to the infusion
of data into our business workflows and
personal streams of life, that nearly 30% of
the Global Datasphere will be real-time by
2025. Enterprises looking to provide superior
customer experience and grow share must
have data infrastructures that can meet this
growth in real-time data.
Today, more than 5 billion consumers interact
with data every day – by 2025, that number
will be 6 billion, or 75% of the world's
population. In 2025, each connected person
will have at least one data interaction every
18 seconds. Many of these interactions are
because of the billions of IoT devices
connected across the globe, which are
expected to create over 90ZB of data in 2025.
The use of data today is transforming the way we
live, work, and play. Businesses in industries
around the world are using data to transform
themselves to become more agile, improve
customer experience, introduce new business
models, and develop new sources of competitive
advantage. Consumers are living in an
increasingly digital world, depending on online
and mobile channels to connect with friends and
family, access goods and services, and run nearly
every aspect of their lives, even while asleep.
Much of today’s economy relies on data, and this
reliance will only increase in the future as
companies capture, catalog, and cash in on data
in every step of their supply chain; enterprises
collect vast sums of customer data to provide
greater levels of personalization; and consumers
integrate social media, entertainment, cloud
storage, and real-time personalized services into
their streams of life.
The consequence of this increasing reliance on
data will be a never-ending expansion in the size
of the Global Datasphere. Estimated to be 33 ZB
in 2018, IDC forecasts the Global Datasphere to
grow to 175 ZB by 2025. (Figure 1). See Appendix
for methodology and data/device categories.
Global Datasphere Expansion
is Never-ending
Chapter 1 Characterizing the Global Datasphere
Figure 1 – Annual Size of the Global Datasphere
Annual Size of the Global Datasphere
MRI image creation is driving storage requirements significantly.
The trend is more images with thinner slices and 3D capability.
We've gone from 2,000 images to over 20,000 for an MRI of a
human head, and stronger magnets and higher resolution
pictures means more data stored.
– Senior Director in IT, Major Healthcare Provider
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 6
180
160
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
Zetabytes
175 ZB
Sometimes it can be
dicult to get our minds
around such a large number.
Here are some illustrations of
just how large 175ZB is.
How big is 175ZB?
The Core is the Heart of the Datasphere
1.
One zettabyte is equivalent to a trillion gigabytes
If you were able to store the entire Global Datasphere on
DVDs, then you would have a stack of DVDs that could
get you to the moon 23 times or circle Earth 222 times.
If you could download the entire 2025 Global Datasphere
at an average of 25 Mb/s, today's average connection
speed across the United States, then it would take one
person 1.8 billion years to do it, or if every person in the
world could help and never rest, then you could get it
done in 81 days.
In this study we isolated three primary data location categories that make up the Datasphere:
This consists of designated computing datacenters in the enterprise and cloud providers. It
includes all varieties of cloud computing, including public, private, and hybrid cloud. It also
includes enterprise operational datacenters, such as those running the electric grid and
telephone networks.
Edge refers to enterprise-hardened servers and appliances that are not in core datacenters. This
includes server rooms, servers in the field, cell towers, and smaller datacenters located regionally
and remotely for faster response times.
Endpoints include all devices on the edge of the network, including PCs, phones, industrial
sensors, connected cars, and wearables.
A key aspect characterizing the Datasphere today is the increasingly critical role of the endpoints
and edge – which is where all the digital data about us or for us is delivered to us to help inform
real-time decisions, personalized services, or other latency-sensitive actions. Data gathered from
endpoints is collected at the edge, which is an important location for delivering the intelligence
and analytics necessary to provide faster response and better end-user experience, as well as to
accelerate and bring new levels of eciency and quality to business.
Use cases at the edge and core that illustrate their criticality are growing aggressively, with entire
categories yet to have even crossed our minds. One increasingly critical engagement between
edge and endpoint is the connected car. Driven largely by the video captured and analyzed by
numerous cameras integrated into the vehicle, IDC estimates that an autonomous vehicle can
create over 3TB of data per hour, and this doesn't include infotainment and GPS data. This data
creation will continue to increase as vehicle-to-vehicle communication becomes commonplace,
and as machine learning and AI continuously update pattern recognition integrated into vehicles’
intelligent driving algorithms.
Core
Edge
Endpoint
2.
3.
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 7
– CISO/CFO, Leading Manufacturing Firm
We’ll have more intelligence and more activity at the edge
on data coming from the generators that we build and the
IoT devices we have deployed…raw data will be analyzed
on the edge first, and then the results will be sent back to
the core for deeper analysis.
Figure 2
Data propagation from endpoints to core and back
Source: IDC’s Data Age 2025 study, sponsored by Seagate
Manufacturers have long sensed and actuated
on real-time data feeds within controlled
manufacturing environments. This has led to
better quality products at significantly lower
prices. Companies are now looking to sense and
actuate on data collected outside the factory
walls, while products are being used.
Manufacturers can extend product life and
reduce product failures by understanding
product performance in random environments
used by customers with a multitude of behavior
profiles. This is now possible with sensors that
are embedded and connected in the everyday
products that we use.
But the heart of the Datasphere is the
core. The core plays a critical role by
providing centralized storage and
archiving, service delivery, deeper-level
analytics, command and control, and
regulatory compliance. As a result, data
flows in a constant stream from endpoints
and the edge to the core and back out to
the edge and endpoints, with each location
playing an important part in the overall
Datasphere. This propagation of data drives data
growth in the core and has ramifications for analytics
and intelligence throughout the network,
powering internal and external processes, as
well as intelligent and predictive engagements
between businesses and individuals across
entire ecosystems (Figure 2). The net eect is
the continued importance and growth in
enterprise storage.
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 8
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Large
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including
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Cloud
Data Created (Datasphere) is dierent than Data Stored
From a data creation perspective (solid lines in
Figure 3), endpoints are declining as a percent
while the core and edge continue to produce
more. From a data storage perspective
(dotted lines in Figure 3), the amount of data
being stored in endpoints will plummet as the
core becomes the repository of choice for data
of all types. By 2024, we expect data stored in
the core to be more than double the data
stored in the endpoint, completely reversing
the dynamic from 2015. Edge storage will also
see significant growth as latency-sensitive
services and applications proliferate
throughout our world.
Figure 3 – Where data is created and stored
– CISO/CFO, Leading Manufacturing Firm
We are beginning to understand the value of data
mining and being able to bring together disparate
data and systems that create that data. We don’t
understand well enough how to do this in an ecient,
cost-eective way. Right now, each system primarily
creates its own data; each system manages its own
data environment.
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Creating and Storing Data by Core/Edge/Endpoint
Endpoint-Create
Endpoint-Store
Edge-Create
Edge-Store
Core-Create
Core-Store
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 9
Figure 4 – Where is the data stored?
Cloud is the New Core…and Much of it is Additive
Today, as greater numbers of devices with greater
levels of intelligence are connected to various
networks, businesses and consumers are finding
the cloud to be an increasingly attractive option
that enables fast, ubiquitous access to their data.
Increasingly, consumers are fine with lower
storage capacity on endpoint devices in favor of
using the cloud. By 2020, we believe that more
bytes will be stored in the public cloud than in
consumer devices (Figure 4), and by 2021, there
will be more data stored in the public cloud than
in traditional datacenters (Figure 5).
– VP of IT, Fortune 50 Financial Services Firm
There is definitely interest in an increase in utilization of
public cloud for data stores as long as we’re good with
governance and identify suitable candidates. It’s still not
going to be customer data for the foreseeable future, but
there are candidates…It’s fair to say that public cloud
utilization is going to double.
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Where is the data stored?
Consumer %
Enterprise %
Public Cloud %
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 10
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Data Stored in Public Clouds vs. Traditional Datacenters
Enterprise Datacenters
Public Cloud
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
Figure 5 – Data Stored in Public Clouds Versus Traditional Datacenters
Business models and the location of data
management may be changing, but the technical
requirements and challenges remain. Data must
be archived and stored in ways that provide
appropriate levels of performance and enable
analytics and intelligence to be applied to them,
but it must be done cost-eectively and securely.
This is not necessarily an easy task given that
some industries still have data in silos within the
corporate walls, as well as outside the corporate
walls residing in branch oces, contractor sites,
or some other location where the data is not
generally accessible.
– CIO and SVP of Corporate IT, Major Media Firm
There is a lot of data that has been done by third parties,
and there’s a lot of data we own but it sits out with other
people. A big part is trying to figure out how we might
bring back that data and store it. We may not even know
what we need it for, but we need it stored in one place so
that others, like data scientists, can have access.
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 11
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
The Enterprise vs. Consumer Datasphere
Installed Base of Bytes by Owner
Enterprise
Consumer
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Enterprise
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
Consumer
Figure 6 and 7 – The Enterprise Datasphere Continues to Expand
The Enterprise Datasphere and Stewardship is Vital to Our Future
The enterprise continues to see its share of
Datasphere stewardship grow, with consumers’
share of data generated dropping from 47% in
2017 to 36% by 2025. This shift is largely driven
by the increasingly always-on and “sensorized”
world that is capturing and analyzing our
environments and creating data 24x7. In the
past, consumers were responsible for much of
their own data, but as data becomes
increasingly centralized across enterprise core
and edge infrastructure, the responsibility to
maintain and manage it is shifting to
enterprise/cloud provider datacenters. The
enterprise is already the primary source and
steward of data creation and storage, and the
trend continues to amplify these responsibilities
(Figures 6 and 7).
– VP of IT, Fortune 50 Financial Services Firm
We have initiatives partnering with facility management,
micro payments, and car manufacturers. We currently have
25 properties, so we leverage IoT to have ecient
optimization around datacenter and portfolio management.
All of those are big sources of data ingest.
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 12
The installed bytes across the enterprise is expected to grow to 13.6ZB, representing
over 80% of the worldwide installed bytes in 2025.
% of Global
Datasphere
Real-Time Data
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
35%
30%
25%
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%
Zetabytes
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
Figure 8 - Real-Time Data
How Much of Global Datasphere is Real-Time?
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
Real-Time Data Demand is Driving the Edge
IDC forecasts that more than 150B devices will
be connected across the globe by 2025, most
of which will be creating data in real time. For
example, automated machines on a
manufacturing floor rely on real-time data for
process control and improvement. Real-time
data represents 15% of the Datasphere in 2017,
and nearly 30% by 2025 (Figure 8).
But it's not just machines that are driving
real-time data. IDC estimates that by 2025,
every connected person in the world on
average will have a digital data engagement
over 4,900 times per day – that's about 1 digital
interaction every 18 seconds (Figure 9).
6,000
5,000
4,000
3,000
2,000
1,000
0
Figure 9 - Data Interactions per Connected Person Per Day
The Number of Interactions/Capita/Day
298
584
1,426
4,909
2010 2015 2020 2025
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 13
The Demand for Storage Remains Strong
The amount of data created in the Global
Datasphere is, of course, the target for the
storage industry. Even with the amount of data
created that is discarded, overwritten, or sensed,
but never stored longer than milliseconds, there
still exists a growing demand for storage
capacity across industries, governments,
enterprises, and consumers.
To live in a digitized world where artificial
intelligence drives business processes, customer
engagements, and autonomous infrastructure or
where consumers' lives are hyper-personalized in
nearly every aspect of behavior – including what
time we'll be awakened based on the previous
day's activities, overnight sleep patterns, and the
next day's calendar – will require creating and
storing more data than ever before.
IDC currently calculates Data Age 2025 storage
capacity shipments across all media types (HDD,
SSD, NVM-flash/other, tape, and optical) over the
next 4 years (2018–2021) will need to exceed the
6.9ZB shipped across all media types over the
past 20 years. IDC forecasts that over 22ZB of
storage capacity must ship across all media
types from 2018 to 2025 to keep up with storage
demands. Around 59% of the capacity will need
to come from the HDD industry and 26% from
flash technology over that same time frame, with
optical storage the only medium to show signs
of fatigue as consumers continue to abandon
DVDs in favor of streaming video and audio
(Figure 10).
HDD
SSD
NVM-NAND
NVM-Other
Optical
Tape
5.0
4.5
4.0
3.5
3.0
2.5
2.0
1.5
1.0
0.5
0
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
Zetabytes
Figure 10 - Worldwide Byte Shipments by Storage Media Type
Worldwide Byte Shipments by Storage Media Type
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 14
The growth in endpoint and edge storage will
favor solid state, while the core continues to
have a voracious appetite for the economical
bytes that hard disk drives and tape provide.
Enterprises will use a mix of disk drives, SSDs,
flash, and tape to satisfy the performance,
management, and archive demands being
placed on them. By the end of 2025, over 80%
of the enterprise bytes shipped into the core
and edge will continue to be HDD bytes when
compared to SSDs and other NVM
technologies (Figure 11).
HDD
SSD
NVM-NAND
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate with data from IDC Global DataSphere, Nov 2018
Figure 11 - Share Worldwide Byte Shipments into the Enterprise Core and Edge by Storage Media Type
Share Worldwide Byte Shipments into the Enterprise
Core and Edge by Storage Media Type
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
By the
end of 2025,
over
of the enterprise bytes shipped
into the core and edge will
continue to be HDD bytes.
80
%
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 15
Whether population driven, application driven
(e.g., video surveillance), or digital
transformation maturity driven, any given
country or region will have a dierent
Datasphere growth profile. Note that the
calculations in regional Dataspheres are based on
where the devices are located from a regional
perspective, as opposed to who may actually own
them. For example, if providers in the U.S. own and
operate datacenters in EMEA, the data created
and stored are part of the EMEA Datasphere.
Regional Dataspheres have their
own unique growth profile
Chapter 2 A Regional Perspective on the Global Datasphere
China has the fastest growing Datasphere of all the regions forecast in this study. The rapid
deployment of video surveillance in China has catapulted the country’s use of enterprise storage,
as well as a large share of endpoint data creation. China is also one of the fastest growing regions
when it comes to the deployment of cloud.
Much of the growth in the EMEA Datasphere is a result of a massive population with associated
endpoint devices used to create and consume massive amounts of data, an already established
base of video surveillance infrastructure, and the initial impact of General Data Protection
Regulation (GDPR) legislation that likely will result in a temporary increase of data until formal
data management practices are implemented fully.
While the U.S. Datasphere continues to grow, it cedes share to the other regions due to its more
mature state in cloud infrastructure and highly penetrated population from an endpoint perspective.
The Asia-Pacific region including Japan, but excluding China, has the second strongest
Datasphere growth with respect to geographies analyzed in this study. Countries like Japan are
spending aggressively on smart city initiatives, which are data-creation intense.
China
EMEA
U.S.A.
APJxC
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 16
Figure 12 looks at the absolute size of each
regional Datasphere while Figure 13 represents
the Datasphere share of the U.S., EMEA,
APJxC, China, and ROW in terms of the share
of bytes generated.
China
EMEA
APJxC
US
ROW
200
180
160
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
Source: IDC’s Data Age 2025 study, sponsored by Seagate
Zetabytes
Figure 12 - Size and Growth of the Global Datasphere by Region
Global Datasphere by Region
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
Figure 13 – Global Datasphere Share by Region
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
35%
30%
25%
20%
15%
10%
5%
0%
Global Datasphere Share by Region
Source: IDC’s Data Age 2025 study, sponsored by Seagate
China
EMEA
APJxC
US
ROW
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 17
Cloud Growth Explodes Outside the United States
China
EMEA
APJxC
US
ROW
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Source: IDC’s Data Age 2025 study, sponsored by Seagate
Figure 14 - Cloud Storage Growth and Share by Region
2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
US – 33
%
EMEA – 46
%
APJxC – 47
%
China – 50
%
ROW – 50
%
The U.S. share of public cloud
storage will drop precipitously
31
while China’s share will more
than double
in
2025
%
13
%
6
to
%
51
in
2017
%
As the headquarters region for the leading global
cloud providers, the United States has traditionally
had the lion’s share of cloud storage, followed by
EMEA and APJxC. And while cloud storage in the
United States will continue to grow, cloud
storage in other regions will grow even faster,
fueled both by the desire to reduce latency
by locating data closer to the end
consumer, as well as corporate and regulatory
mandates requiring data to be housed locally
within dierent regions. The U.S. share of public
cloud storage will drop precipitously from 51% in
2017 to 31% by 2025, while China’s share will more
than double from 6% to 13% (Figure 14).
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 18
Cloud Storage Growth and Share by Region
2015-2025 CAGR
IDC’s global survey in support of this project
indicates that other regions are beginning to
eclipse the U.S. in certain measures of data
maturity. In particular, China and APJ show
better metrics in several areas.
China and APJ are more likely to have
corporate-driven digital transformation
initiatives, to be able to quantify the value of
their data, and to increase their usage of edge
computing (Figure 15). This is helped in
emerging markets by a lower level of
investment in older legacy IT.
Do you expect your organization's utilization of edge
computing to increase in the next 2 years?
Question
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
298
584
1,426
China APJxC U.S. EMEA
YES
99
%
YES
91
%
YES
88
%
YES
82
%
Figure 15 – Increased Use of Edge Computing
Source: IDC’s Data Age 2025 study, sponsored by Seagate, n=959
China and Asia Pacific/Japan Have Edge in Data Maturity
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 19
Source: IDC’s Data Age 2025 study, sponsored by Seagate
Introducing the DATa Readiness CONdition Index
Digital transformation and the
resulting growth in data
Chapter 3 Industry Perspective on the Global Datasphere
Growth in data is happening across all industries
and geographies, but not all businesses are
impacted in the same way. Some rely more on the
cloud, while others continue to rely more on their
own datacenters, sometimes very massive ones.
Industries are in various states of readiness and
need to take action to prepare for and capitalize on
a new era of data growth.
To characterize dierences by dierent industries, IDC
created the DATCON (DATa Readiness CONdition)
index, the first index of its kind to evaluate how
prepared various industries are for managing,
analyzing, and storing data. It also identifies gaps that
need to be addressed and the most pressing
initiatives businesses must consider. The DATCON
index is a scale from 1 to 5, where 5 represents an
industry that is completely optimized and where 1
represents an industry in critical condition with
respect to its readiness to manage and fully monetize
the data it creates, captures, stores, and analyzes.
5
DATCON Index
4
3
2
1
Optimized
Advanced
Average
Needful
Critical
Industry is
leading in DX
Industry leading
in some areas of
digital
transformation
Industry on
par with the
average
Industry is in
catch-up mode
Industry
disarray
Suppliers are
synced and
healthy
Vibrant
ecosystem
Decent
ecosystem with
similar visions
Limited vision,
though there
are pockets of
action
Disaggregated
ecosystem
A DX culture is
driven throughout
from the top
Many DX initiatives
owned and
budgeted at the
highest level
Some C-level
commitment
There may be
some 3
rd
-platform
initiatives, but
limited
No vision for
3
rd
-platform
technologies
A skilled workforce
is executing
advanced initiatives
Data management
well under
control
Corporate-owned
visions and
initiatives in place
No C-level
commitment,
often a LOB
initiative
No leadership
within companies
A strong vision
exists on what data
is needed, leveraged,
and monetized
Good pulse on
leveraging data
to fullest extent
Usually strong
in one area of
3
rd
-platform
technologies
Most data never
monetized
An impending
data tsunami with
no survival plans
Figure 16 – Data Readiness Condition (DATCON) Levels
Figure 16 illustrates the 1 to 5 DATCON index with descriptions that provide further characterization of each level.
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 20
The DATCON index is a calculated score that is
synthesized across six assessment vectors and
numerous associated metrics informed
through global surveys, ongoing IDC research,
expert analysis, and proprietary modeling
techniques.
Data growth and investment
Digital transformation
competency
IT structural assessment
C-level involvement
Data value competency
Leadership self-score
Financial services
Manufacturing
Healthcare
Media and entertainment
These assessment vectors include:
For this study, IDC focused on four industries to develop the DATCON index:
DATCON Industries Comprise Nearly
Half of the Enterprise Datasphere
48
%
of the Enterprise
Datasphere
The four DATCON industries chosen in this
study (financial services, manufacturing,
healthcare, and media and entertainment)
comprise 48% of the Enterprise
Datasphere, with manufacturing
responsible for the largest share of data,
followed by financial services and media and
entertainment (Figure 17).
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 21
For additional information about the DATCON index methodology and
detailed findings by industry, Click here
Figure 18 – Comparing Industry Datasphere Growth Rates
Source: IDC’s Data Age 2025 study, sponsored by Seagate
While healthcare is the smallest of the four
industry Dataspheres in this study, it is primed
to grow faster than the rest given the
advancements in healthcare analytics,
increasing frequency and resolution of MRIs,
and other image and video-related data being
captured in today’s advanced modes of
medical care. IDC compares growth of various
industry Dataspheres to the overall Global
Datasphere growth through 2025 in Figure 18.
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate, Nov 2018
2018-2025 CAGR
Global Datasphere Healthcare Manufacturing Financial Services
Media and Entertainment
26
%
27
%
36
%
30
%
25
%
4,500
4,000
3,500
3,000
2,500
2,000
1,500
1,000
500
0
2018 Enterprise Datasphere by Industry (EB)
4,239
280
717
1,555
2,212
1,296
1,218
3,584
2,074
Financial Services
Manufacturing
Healthcare
Retail/WH
Infrastructure
1
Transportation
Resource
2
Other
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 22
Figure 17 - 2018 Enterprise Datasphere by Industry
Media and
Entertainment
1
Infrastructure includes Utilities, Telecommunications
2
Resource includes Oil and Gas (Mining), Transportation of oil & gas through pipelines or shipping, Resource industries, Petroleum and coal
_manufacturing/refining
Source: Data Age 2025, sponsored by Seagate, Nov 2018, n=1,081
The Interplay Between Core, Edge, and Endpoint is Key in All Industries
While all industries have examples of waves of
data traversing the core, edge, and endpoints, in
which data collected at the endpoints is
processed at the edge, propagated at the core,
then distributed back out to the endpoints, the
greatest use of edge computing in the four
industries in the DATCON index is found in
manufacturing and financial services (Figure 19).
Does your organization utilize edge computing?
Question
Financial Services Manufacturing Healthcare
Media and Entertainment
YES
62
%
No
33
%
No
38
%
No
45
%
No
62
%
YES
58
%
YES
48
%
YES
34
%
Figure 19 – Use of Edge Computing
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Don’t know Don’t know Don’t know Don’t know
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 23
IDC came across multiple examples of this data flow across the core, edge, and endpoints in its
interviews for this project. Some of them include the following:
Manufacturers have multiple use cases such as
factory automation and control, but a
particularly notable one mentioned by a
manufacturer had to do with IoT data from
engines it builds and sells. It collects telemetry
and other operating data which it then pulls
back into the core to perform advanced
analytics to tweak manufacturing processes,
but which it also shares with its dealers and
distributors, so they can be more responsive to
customers’ needs.
Firms circulate data between core, edge, and
endpoint for a variety of use cases including
analytics and branch operations. Fraud
detection on the edge is a growing use case
for banks and other financial firms given its
immediate impact on the balance sheet. ATM
machines are being outfitted with analytics
engines to authenticate would-be ATM
customers looking to withdraw funds.
Complex algorithms that capture various
forms of personal biometric data and
behavior are coalesced into a unique
identifier that authenticates identity as
customers approach the ATM – all the while
creating data at the edge.
Providers are taking advantage of greater
intelligence being built into diagnostic
equipment and patient devices that can collect
patient data, upload it to the cloud or a
centralized datacenter for analysis or diagnosis,
and then receive instructions or
recommendations based on the patient’s
specific needs. In the future, in-home robotic
healthcare assistants will monitor elderly
patients and provide notification if an individual
requires assistance, ensure medication is taken,
and even perform simple tasks.
Companies interviewed by IDC spoke of
ongoing eorts to repatriate data, pulling
digitized data from marketing groups, third
parties, and other sources back to the core
where it can be repurposed, re-used, and
analyzed. Based on the results of that analysis
the appropriate data is then repropagated back
to the end users and devices that require it. In
the future, entertainment content might be
tailored in real time based on a consumer’s
responses and biometric reactions. Intensity of
eects could be increased or decreased
appropriately to ensure the best experience in
augmented or virtual realities.
Manufacturing Healthcare
Financial Services
Media and Entertainment
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 24
For additional information on each the four industries profiled in the
DATCON index, Click here
As data is shifting from a consumer-centric
model to an enterprise-centric model, this
increases the burden on enterprises to provide
an excellent experience. Enterprises are
responsible for providing correct insights and
excellent customer experience, even storing
customers’ digital lives. Ensure your data model
provides secure, ubiquitous, real-time access to
services and data. As consumers become more
demanding of the experience in their digital lives,
companies must ensure that they are providing
data and services that are real-time, on the go
via any network, and are personalized.
Cloud providers have emerged as a serious
contender for enterprise data storage and
services. The largest providers have resources,
scale, security, and performance that few
enterprises can match. Their global reach
enables businesses to provide services to global
geographies, and their centralized access
enables company resources to tap into all of a
company's data to drive analytics today and
artificial intelligence in the future.
It is increasingly important for companies to take
a global approach to their data to provide
low-latency, better customer experience and to
address regulatory and compliance pressures
requiring operators to locate data in regions in
which customers are located. Whether in their
own datacenters or via cloud providers,
companies need to consider which data needs to
be located as close as possible to their customers
and where in the network it should be located
(core vs. edge, cloud vs. own datacenters).
Intelligent data is being sought to drive our
businesses and lives in real time and on-the-go.
Many times, data has no time to travel from an
endpoint to the core and back when informing
real-time decisions. The enterprise edge helps
to bridge this gap. Whether taking on data
analytics or simply storing analyzed and
intelligent data, the edge will play an increasing
role in enabling a real-time world.
IDC developed the DATCON index to characterize
the readiness level of dierent industries, and to
enable individual companies to assess their level of
readiness across a number of metrics. When it comes
to improving data readiness, it is important for
executives to lead corporate initiatives, make certain
that budgets exist, and ensure that data-savvy
workers are hired and empowered to execute.
Organizations born of the days when IT
departments dealt with back oce file-and-record
processing are now facing a deluge of real-time,
interrupt-driven bits and bytes from field
organizations. Many IT organizations are finding
themselves being given responsibility for physical
security as well as data security, for operational
data that was once sequestered on the factory
floor, the grid, or the operating room, and for
integrating data repositories previously kept in
separate silos. Dealing with digital transformation
will require not just new technology, but also new
skills, political savvy, and relationships with top
management.
IDC Guidance
Chapter 4
Enterprises must rise to the data
guardianship challenge
Take a global approach to your data
Cloud migration is strategic
Invest in the edge
Ensure your organization is
data-ready
Ready your IT organization for
digital transformation
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 25
Data is
helping us reach
new markets, better
serve existing customers,
streamline operations, and
monetize raw and
analyzed data.
As consumers, data is helping us build more
and deeper connections, and to access
products and services more quickly and easily,
at the time and place of our choosing. We can
now walk into a store and walk out with our
purchases, leaving our transaction record (and
perhaps facial image) as a digital trail, but never
having to pull out a credit card or cash.
As businesses, data is helping us reach new
markets, better serve existing customers,
streamline operations, and monetize raw and
analyzed data. If reported global intangible
assets of companies are more than $200 trillion
dollars*, what must – and will – the value of
unreported data assets be? Data is an
intangible asset and underpins most other
intangible assets like patents and goodwill.
Bytes can be made more valuable by
surrounding them with security, leveraging
them in AI, or using them to cure diseases.
Nevertheless, there is a cost associated with
data: purchasing, maintaining, and protecting
storage, as well as the cost of losing data or
having sensitive data fall into the hands of a
competitor or hacker. The real value of data is
out there, and companies are just finding out
that data has real worth. Those businesses first
through the gateway of digital transformation
will be the first to find out just how valuable
their data is.
The Global Datasphere is large and complex,
with key interdependencies between core, edge,
and endpoints. While the edge and endpoints
will continue to play a critical role as the place
where the Datasphere meets the physical world,
the core remains the heart of the Datasphere
gathering data from the edges and endpoints,
processing and archiving it, and promulgating it
back for consumption by end users, including
machines and things – and the cloud is a vital
part of this core.
Companies looking to be relevant between now
and 2025 will need to understand the role data
plays in their organization and how the
Datasphere will evolve during that period. They
will need to embrace their role as data
guardians, leverage the cloud, and take a global
approach to their data. Dierent industries have
dierent levels of data maturity, so companies
should review the IDC DATCON index reports to
learn where they stand relative to their industry
index and what they need to do to not just
survive – but more importantly to thrive – in
their own Datasphere.
Data is Changing the World
Chapter 5 Conclusion
* Source: IDC’s Intangible Asset Market Value Study, 2018
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 26
The Measure of the Global
Datasphere
Methodology
The Global Datasphere is a measure of all new data
that is captured, created, and replicated in any given
year across the globe.
An installed base of over 70 categories of
content creation/capture devices, including
embedded systems in devices like
automobiles, gasoline pumps, vending
machines, and kiosks, were sized by
geography and industry. Content creation and
capture and replication and consumption
calculations were applied to this installed base
of devices.
The broad category of devices includes:
The aggregation of all these calculations is called
our Global Datasphere.
1
2
3
4
Non-entertainment imaging
Entertainment
Productivity
Voice
e.g., medical imaging, MFPs, surveillance cameras, etc.
e.g., digital TV/radio, movies, video games, etc.
e.g. PCs, servers, supercomputers, metadata, embedded systems
e.g. mobile phones, VoIP, etc.
IDC White Paper I Doc# US44413318 I November 2018
The Digitization of the World – From Edge to Core I 27
About IDC
Global
Headquarters
International Data Corporation (IDC) is the
premier global provider of market intelligence,
advisory services, and events for the
information technology, telecommunications
and consumer technology markets. IDC helps
IT professionals, business executives, and the
investment community make fact-based
decisions on technology purchases and
business strategy. More than 1,100 IDC analysts
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ANALYZE THE FUTURE
More than 1,100 IDC analysts provide global, regional,
and local expertise on technology and industry opportunities
and trends in over 110 countries worldwide.
