Big data game will get bigger with startups

Some might say, big data caused big ripples after Trump’s victory. Hillary’s win was a sure thing, reflected by a majority of the forecasts based on predictive analytics. It was a lesson for all – data science reflects probability, it does not make any promises. But tech giants aren’t fazed by election results. Companies are leveraging analytics and customers are lapping it up. 

While analytics might not have succeeded in fighting diseases (We are looking at you Google Flu), worldwide revenue for big data and business analytics will hit USD 187 billion in 2019, according to IDC.

In data we trust. Because data sells. 

IDC states that the big data analytics (BDA) market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 11.7 percent through 2020 and hit USD 203 billion in revenue. The industries driving this billion-dollar growth in BDA include banking, discrete manufacturing, process manufacturing, central government, and professional services, says IDC. And these will remain the top five industries generating maximum revenue for BDA through 2020. 

However, customer experience is at the heart of data analytics, so telecom will not be far behind. Telecommunications, utilities, insurance, and transportation will join banking as the industries with the largest CAGRs through 2020, according to the research firm. 

The playing field will be dominated by large and very large companies. IDC states that large corporations will generate revenues of USD 154 billion in 2020. Whereas, small and medium businesses (SMBs) will contribute a quarter of the overall revenues. This is a promising scenario for small businesses and analytics startups. 

IDC forecasts that by 2020, the US market for big data and business analytics will reach more than USD 95 billion. The second largest market by region will be Western Europe, followed by Asia Pacific, excluding Japan) and Latin America. 

However, in Asia Pacific, spending on cloud-based BDA technology will take over and grow to be three-times faster than on premise solutions. 

Big disruption in Indian market 

According to Nasscom, India has emerged as an analytics product hub with more than 600 analytics firms and nearly 400 startups. The industry body estimates analytics revenue in India will hit USD 16 billion by 2025, at a CAGR of 26 percent. India will echo the cloud based analytics trend of the US market. There will be considerable growth in cloud-based (SaaS) and predictive analytics solutions, says Nasscom. 

And here is where it gets more interesting. As data gathering becomes more complex, the inclusion of cloud and internet of things will add to the volume of data. It is no surprise then, that research firm Markets and Markets says that the Hadoop big data analytics market is expected to grow from USD 6.71 billion in 2016 to USD 40.69 billion by 2021, at a CAGR of 43.4 percent. 

“The intermingling of cloud and analytics will lead to the emergence of new engagement models, according to Nasscom. Organizations will dig deeper into Artificial Intelligence (AI) and deep learning algorithm for analytics. AI is not merely the domain of technology giants. A massive amount of capital has been pumped into the analytics firms in India. Nasscom states that USD 700 million has been invested into Indian startups over the last two and a half years. 

Whether we will wake up to an AI assistant’s voice in the next five years is debatable. But yes, the technology is being developed and the organizations want to listen to the customers, quite literally. Because, data is king.