As IDC Sees It, Tech's 'Third Platform' Disrupts Everyone

What, you might ask, is the third platform It's the next-generation IT software foundation:

From IDC's perspective, what we call IT is rapidly shifting to the third platform. This succeeds the first two platforms - mainframe and client/server/Internet technology, respectively. Its capabilities will transform who provides IT solutions, who applies them and how they're used.

The report identifies 10 trends for 2014; all, from my perspective, ring true. I want to discuss several in some detail, since they represent such a disruptive impact on business-as-usual as it has been practiced over the lifetime of what we call the Information Age.

Put another way, the trends represent the true emergence of the information age - what went before was really just nascent information technology tacked onto a relatively undisturbed Industrial Age.

All IT Growth Will Come From Third Platform