1.

Data security will reinforce its positions

The range of threads is enormous; therefore the discussion of the cybersecurity related
issues will continue. The consumers have a growing awareness of the value of their
information. Consequently, they become even more interested in the way how it will be
used. Governments are actively planning, developing and adopting regulations on
cybersecurity in this regard. Due to some cases of violation of the General Data
Protection Regulation (GDPR) and loud scandals concerning Google and Facebook the
application of enforcement measures is expected in 2019.

Moreover, we believe that cybersecurity will become more intelligence-driven in the

upcoming year. Intelligence may become the only solution to the fast, automated
attacks. Machine learning is called upon to play a crucial role in providing this
intelligence. The AI-powered smart machines are expected to become more
independent in the decision-making process. Probably, it will help companies to be one
step ahead of the hacker, to predict attacks and define possible sore points.
2. Internet of Things will deliver new opportunities

It is quite evident that IoT is now being used by the companies representing all spheres
of human activity. Moreover, the companies and businesspeople get even more
interested in the practical implementation of smart technological solutions rather than in
theoretical development. The attributes like “connected”, “smart” or “intelligent” are now
added to all technologies and solutions developed for various industries.
According to some specialists, it is yet not the time to regard the IoT as something
done. Undoubtedly the changes brought by the IoT are only under development. In
2019 the IoT capabilities are expected to shift to automating and augmenting how
people experience the connected world. It will most probably result in a more
unstructured landscape of a wide variety of dynamically meshed things and services.

3. Automation continues to be game-changing

The automation has entered in different industries, won a dominant position and
acquired a good reputation. Undoubtedly, 2019 will bring progress, upgrade, and
prosperity to robotic automation.
Autonomous things like drones, robots and autonomous vehicles are rapidly developed
along with AI solutions. We expect a shift from the stand-alone things to complex
systems of intelligent autonomous things. With the development of the AI technologies,
autonomous things get more and more brains to interact and establish interrelations
within complex systems. Thus, self-driven cars are capable of images recognition and
geolocation tracking for making routes, voice recognition to follow the commands and
various other technologies to provide convenience and comfort to people.
The RPA, or robotic process automation, is no longer a one-day technology. Nowadays
it proved to be a technology changing the businesses. In 2019, the number of attended
robots, those working alongside humans, is going to grow even more significant. In
additions, the RPA in the public sector will rise, and governments will discover new
opportunities with RPA.

4. AR is expected to overcome VR
For the 2018 year it was common to consider VR (virtual reality software) to be the most
significant achievement of our generation. However, the situation has dramatically
changed. VR proved to have a limited range of application among the companies and
the customers. Therefore, the experts forecast the overcoming of VR by the AR
(augmented reality software) soon.
The AR technologies will continue to be profitable for enterprise software development.
In 2019, AR will become more common for mobile devices. Unlike VR, it does not
require headsets. Therefore the AR’s ability to be deployed on mobile phones and
tablets is far more robust.
Also, it is expected that AR will change the spheres of marketing and advertising in the
upcoming year. AR provides a completely personal experience. Thus customers’
engagement is skyrocketing. A consistent communication channel for direct dialogue
between the customer and provider will be ensured using the AR developments.
Probably, AR will also reinforce its position in the area of manufacturing. Industrial AR
platforms help the manufacturers to visualize data sets and provide assistance in jobs
related to physical labor. It is predicted that AR software will become a key to the
transformation of this sphere.

5. Connected clouds will shift to hybrid cloud solutions

The majority of companies now rely on cloud computing. Therefore, the consumption of
cloud services is going to grow over in 2019. Gartner predicts that the cloud computing
market will reach $200 billion.
The range of cloud solutions and delivery models is getting bigger and bigger. This fact
makes cloud services more adaptable in different areas of activity. Hybrid cloud
solutions will be winning popularity among companies. However, they will also present a
challenge for some companies. The majority of IT service providers think that hybrid
cloud solutions help to speed up service delivery. This is a crucial milestone. At first,
cloud solution was regarded as a way to avoid building vast IT infrastructures from
scratch and in such a way to reduce costs. Shortly these solutions will bring more
flexibility and the abilities to react fast and even more efficiently to the rapidly changing
market conditions. A new view on the cloud solutions adoption will be developed by the
industries. So, we expect 2019 to be the year of hybrid and multi-cloud solutions for
business.

6. Personalization will result in the rise of adaptive devices

Actually we are the witnesses of the immense evolution of AI-powered chatbot

technology. Starting with simple routine tasks, chatbots are now actively turning into AI
assistants. Customers got used to them very fasts and now cannot even imagine
dealing with some issues without AI assistance.
Moreover, personalization will be represented not only due to the purposeful user
commands for different devices but also in the devices themselves. Thus, they will be
able to adapt themselves to the individual needs of the owner after a certain period,
even without any commands on his part. This technology has become rather
sophisticated. Thus the majority of customers cannot even guess whether they
communicate with a person or with a chatbot.
Due to the excellent operation of Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa, people started to rely
more on AI assistants in daily routine. What is expected in 2019 is that even more
advanced assistants will appear and take responsibility for more complex dealings. With
the help of the improved speech recognition techniques, the AI assistance will get a
chance to provide you with a far more personalized experience. Perhaps you will find
yourself speaking, communicating, and giving tasks to your refrigerator or lamp, as well
as letting your car build the best routes and drive you there shortly.
7. Reinforcement learning and new architectures of neural networks
will revolutionize prediction

The key idea of the neural networks is to create millions of active interconnections
within computer brains to provide it with multiple opportunities to perform tasks and
learn from them. A primary neural network usually consists of millions of artificial
neurons. They proved to learn from image, text, audio data very efficiently. It is
expected that due to the new theory applying the principle of an information bottleneck
the deep neural networks will forget noisy data, yet to preserve the information what this
data represents. Thus, the neural networks become more and more alike to the neurons
of human beings.
Reinforcement learning (RL) in its turn is a form of neural network that usually learns
from its environment with the help of observation, actions, and rewards. Reinforcement
learning has not been widely applied in various industries due to the existence of some
obstacles and complications. The following facts may explain it: RL involves more
complex algorithms and less mature tools and requires accurate simulations of the real-
world environment. However, the potential capabilities of RL proved to be enormous. It
can easily solve traditional neural networks problems. These are the three main
problems: the absence of training data, the lack of training data, and the high cost of
training data. These factors make reinforcement learning a good method for solving
sequential decision-making problems that are common in game playing, financial
markets, and robotics.
Most likely reinforcement learning will become one of the most significant trends in
2019. Due to the successes of DeepMind’s, AlphaZero and OpenAI's Dota bot, a lot of
companies are now actively investing in the development of reinforcement learning
platforms. These platforms will considerably increase the opportunities of the
companies. Moreover, there is a whole generation of data scientists who regard RL as a
means to revolutionize prediction. Therefore the implementation of RL will find a vast
amount of use cases in various industries.

8. Energy efficiency and sustainable development remain core goals

for humanity

The matters of energy sources and their efficient use exponentially increase their
popularity every year. There is a whole range of factors that will influence the energy
market in 2019.
First of all, efficient energy management demands more insights into energy usage.
Therefore, smart tools are to be widely applied here. The new regulations will come into
effect in 2019. Also, we expect the strengthening of interconnection between
technologies and energy. Integrated platforms and smart data solutions will bring their
benefits both to the energy producers and energy consumers.
Sustainability continues to be a core goal for every single company. And as a last but
not least, a growth on the energy storage market is expected in 2019. Get ready for the
more common use of portable energy sources and GaN (gallium-nitride) solutions for
efficient use and storage of residential and commercial energy.

9. Upgrading humans becomes real

2019 promises to become a year of AI technologies application in healthcare and

medicine. People will face with a chance to get new opportunities, physical and mental
capabilities they could not even dream of before. Humans will get a chance to modify,
improve and continually upgrade their abilities and minds.
AI applications are capable to accelerate and improve accuracy of diagnosis. Machine
learning algorithms will be used to explore the biological and chemical interactions of
drugs. Telemedicine will also improve healthcare by making it easier for patients to
communicate with doctors. It will provide better opportunities for treating and monitoring
chronic diseases 24/7.
Also, biomedical electronics will take the stage. The digital technologies are to broaden
the sphere of their competence in providing assistance doctors and mitigating the
stressful situations. Bionics and biomedical electronics will introduce new solutions for
people with handicaps or those suffering from severe illnesses or some injuries.
Nowadays, prosthetics are being developed extremely fast. New light and reliable
materials, 3D printing technologies and smart algorithms allow building highly-functional
prosthesis.

10. Smart spaces will continue growing into smart cities

During the last several decades the way people live, work and interact has been
considerably changed. The focus of human life has shifted from nature to technologies.
Rapid development of science, industrial revolution and constant development of new
technologies largely influenced on the way people live. The life is speeding up.
Nowadays, the borderline between virtual and physical blurs. The technology became
an essential part of our daily life. Thus, there evolves the need to create spaces where
technologies and physical environment will successfully coexist.
Smart space is a physical or digital environment where people and AI-powered
technological solution can efficiently interact. Because technologies have entered our
daily life, smart space is going to win its popularity in the upcoming year. Smart spaces
take individual technologies and combine them into collaborative and interactive
environments. The growing popularity of smart spaces reflects in the appearance of
smart cities, digital workplaces, smart homes and companies.