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Looking Back at 2018 APM Predictions - Did They Come True? Part 2

Jonah Kowall

I would like to highlight some of the predictions made at the start of 2018, and how those have panned out, or not actually occurred. I will review some of the predictions and trends from APMdigest's 2018 APM Predictions.

Here is Part 2:

Start with Looking Back at 2018 APM Predictions - Did They Come True? Part 1

Microtrends

The use of chatbots and other connected assistants have not yielded any benefits in the IT Operations space in 2018, but there are many emerging startups in this area looking to change that over the coming years. While several companies such as ServiceNow and Microsoft made acquisitions in this market, they haven’t produced anything tangible, especially not in 2018. Time will tell if these are a passing fad or they become a cornerstone of computing.

IoT is still nascent, especially in the APM market. The predictions about its growing importance and adoption of APM for IoT are still generally immature and early stage. There are some incredible stories for those doing this, but it’s still a very small number today. Those predictions around IoT are likely too early.

Similarly, Blockchain doesn’t even go there, way too early considering how few real implementations of Blockchain are implemented in production at this point. Maybe in another five years, we can begin to make some predictions, but it will likely be longer before Blockchain performance management solutions are needed by the market.

Culture and Communication

The biggest barrier to transformation is culture and people. This has been clear from every major CIO survey conducted in the last 10 years of economic growth in this bull market. Our communications and the way we do incident response have evolved significantly. The players in this space are solving an extremely important problem, one which MAY change the culture of an organization. This trend will continue as these technologies become essential to better communication of increasingly distributed workforces.

The codification of the role of the SRE by the excellent second book from Google has helped the industry understand how to apply DevOps in an even more concrete manner. The predictions about SRE were spot on, as SRE has become the gold standard for managing and operating applications. Still early for most organizations, but now on the radar. There were several predictions about SRE for the past year. I would, however, say that the vendors who predicted DevOps and culture change by a tool were sadly far from reality. Tools don’t change cultures, but cultural changes often require tool changes.

Wrapping up a great 2018, I wish everyone a productive and creative 2019 where we can listen, learn, innovate, share, and advance our group of APM vendors and practitioners. There are many problems to solve, and new approaches being invented daily by this amazing community.

Hot Topics

The Latest

From smart factories and autonomous vehicles to real-time analytics and intelligent building systems, the demand for instant, local data processing is exploding. To meet these needs, organizations are leaning into edge computing. The promise? Faster performance, reduced latency and less strain on centralized infrastructure. But there's a catch: Not every network is ready to support edge deployments ...

Every digital customer interaction, every cloud deployment, and every AI model depends on the same foundation: the ability to see, understand, and act on data in real time ... Recent data from Splunk confirms that 74% of the business leaders believe observability is essential to monitoring critical business processes, and 66% feel it's key to understanding user journeys. Because while the unknown is inevitable, observability makes it manageable. Let's explore why ...

Organizations that perform regular audits and assessments of AI system performance and compliance are over three times more likely to achieve high GenAI value than organizations that do not, according to a survey by Gartner ...

Kubernetes has become the backbone of cloud infrastructure, but it's also one of its biggest cost drivers. Recent research shows that 98% of senior IT leaders say Kubernetes now drives cloud spend, yet 91% still can't optimize it effectively. After years of adoption, most organizations have moved past discovery. They know container sprawl, idle resources and reactive scaling inflate costs. What they don't know is how to fix it ...

Artificial intelligence is no longer a future investment. It's already embedded in how we work — whether through copilots in productivity apps, real-time transcription tools in meetings, or machine learning models fueling analytics and personalization. But while enterprise adoption accelerates, there's one critical area many leaders have yet to examine: Can your network actually support AI at the speed your users expect? ...

The more technology businesses invest in, the more potential attack surfaces they have that can be exploited. Without the right continuity plans in place, the disruptions caused by these attacks can bring operations to a standstill and cause irreparable damage to an organization. It's essential to take the time now to ensure your business has the right tools, processes, and recovery initiatives in place to weather any type of IT disaster that comes up. Here are some effective strategies you can follow to achieve this ...

In today's fast-paced AI landscape, CIOs, IT leaders, and engineers are constantly challenged to manage increasingly complex and interconnected systems. The sheer scale and velocity of data generated by modern infrastructure can be overwhelming, making it difficult to maintain uptime, prevent outages, and create a seamless customer experience. This complexity is magnified by the industry's shift towards agentic AI ...

In MEAN TIME TO INSIGHT Episode 19, Shamus McGillicuddy, VP of Research, Network Infrastructure and Operations, at EMA explains the cause of the AWS outage in October ... 

The explosion of generative AI and machine learning capabilities has fundamentally changed the conversation around cloud migration. It's no longer just about modernization or cost savings — it's about being able to compete in a market where AI is rapidly becoming table stakes. Companies that can't quickly spin up AI workloads, feed models with data at scale, or experiment with new capabilities are falling behind faster than ever before. But here's what I'm seeing: many organizations want to capitalize on AI, but they're stuck ...

On September 16, the world celebrated the 10th annual IT Pro Day, giving companies a chance to laud the professionals who serve as the backbone to almost every successful business across the globe. Despite the growing importance of their roles, many IT pros still work in the background and often go underappreciated ...

Looking Back at 2018 APM Predictions - Did They Come True? Part 2

Jonah Kowall

I would like to highlight some of the predictions made at the start of 2018, and how those have panned out, or not actually occurred. I will review some of the predictions and trends from APMdigest's 2018 APM Predictions.

Here is Part 2:

Start with Looking Back at 2018 APM Predictions - Did They Come True? Part 1

Microtrends

The use of chatbots and other connected assistants have not yielded any benefits in the IT Operations space in 2018, but there are many emerging startups in this area looking to change that over the coming years. While several companies such as ServiceNow and Microsoft made acquisitions in this market, they haven’t produced anything tangible, especially not in 2018. Time will tell if these are a passing fad or they become a cornerstone of computing.

IoT is still nascent, especially in the APM market. The predictions about its growing importance and adoption of APM for IoT are still generally immature and early stage. There are some incredible stories for those doing this, but it’s still a very small number today. Those predictions around IoT are likely too early.

Similarly, Blockchain doesn’t even go there, way too early considering how few real implementations of Blockchain are implemented in production at this point. Maybe in another five years, we can begin to make some predictions, but it will likely be longer before Blockchain performance management solutions are needed by the market.

Culture and Communication

The biggest barrier to transformation is culture and people. This has been clear from every major CIO survey conducted in the last 10 years of economic growth in this bull market. Our communications and the way we do incident response have evolved significantly. The players in this space are solving an extremely important problem, one which MAY change the culture of an organization. This trend will continue as these technologies become essential to better communication of increasingly distributed workforces.

The codification of the role of the SRE by the excellent second book from Google has helped the industry understand how to apply DevOps in an even more concrete manner. The predictions about SRE were spot on, as SRE has become the gold standard for managing and operating applications. Still early for most organizations, but now on the radar. There were several predictions about SRE for the past year. I would, however, say that the vendors who predicted DevOps and culture change by a tool were sadly far from reality. Tools don’t change cultures, but cultural changes often require tool changes.

Wrapping up a great 2018, I wish everyone a productive and creative 2019 where we can listen, learn, innovate, share, and advance our group of APM vendors and practitioners. There are many problems to solve, and new approaches being invented daily by this amazing community.

Hot Topics

The Latest

From smart factories and autonomous vehicles to real-time analytics and intelligent building systems, the demand for instant, local data processing is exploding. To meet these needs, organizations are leaning into edge computing. The promise? Faster performance, reduced latency and less strain on centralized infrastructure. But there's a catch: Not every network is ready to support edge deployments ...

Every digital customer interaction, every cloud deployment, and every AI model depends on the same foundation: the ability to see, understand, and act on data in real time ... Recent data from Splunk confirms that 74% of the business leaders believe observability is essential to monitoring critical business processes, and 66% feel it's key to understanding user journeys. Because while the unknown is inevitable, observability makes it manageable. Let's explore why ...

Organizations that perform regular audits and assessments of AI system performance and compliance are over three times more likely to achieve high GenAI value than organizations that do not, according to a survey by Gartner ...

Kubernetes has become the backbone of cloud infrastructure, but it's also one of its biggest cost drivers. Recent research shows that 98% of senior IT leaders say Kubernetes now drives cloud spend, yet 91% still can't optimize it effectively. After years of adoption, most organizations have moved past discovery. They know container sprawl, idle resources and reactive scaling inflate costs. What they don't know is how to fix it ...

Artificial intelligence is no longer a future investment. It's already embedded in how we work — whether through copilots in productivity apps, real-time transcription tools in meetings, or machine learning models fueling analytics and personalization. But while enterprise adoption accelerates, there's one critical area many leaders have yet to examine: Can your network actually support AI at the speed your users expect? ...

The more technology businesses invest in, the more potential attack surfaces they have that can be exploited. Without the right continuity plans in place, the disruptions caused by these attacks can bring operations to a standstill and cause irreparable damage to an organization. It's essential to take the time now to ensure your business has the right tools, processes, and recovery initiatives in place to weather any type of IT disaster that comes up. Here are some effective strategies you can follow to achieve this ...

In today's fast-paced AI landscape, CIOs, IT leaders, and engineers are constantly challenged to manage increasingly complex and interconnected systems. The sheer scale and velocity of data generated by modern infrastructure can be overwhelming, making it difficult to maintain uptime, prevent outages, and create a seamless customer experience. This complexity is magnified by the industry's shift towards agentic AI ...

In MEAN TIME TO INSIGHT Episode 19, Shamus McGillicuddy, VP of Research, Network Infrastructure and Operations, at EMA explains the cause of the AWS outage in October ... 

The explosion of generative AI and machine learning capabilities has fundamentally changed the conversation around cloud migration. It's no longer just about modernization or cost savings — it's about being able to compete in a market where AI is rapidly becoming table stakes. Companies that can't quickly spin up AI workloads, feed models with data at scale, or experiment with new capabilities are falling behind faster than ever before. But here's what I'm seeing: many organizations want to capitalize on AI, but they're stuck ...

On September 16, the world celebrated the 10th annual IT Pro Day, giving companies a chance to laud the professionals who serve as the backbone to almost every successful business across the globe. Despite the growing importance of their roles, many IT pros still work in the background and often go underappreciated ...