What are the priorities for IT in 2022? Here’s a round up of the key trends and technology priorities for businesses.

It’s a new year! I know many people are looking forward to putting some of the challenges of the previous years behind us, but the impact will continue to be felt by our businesses, our customers and the IT priorities in 2022.

Technology can fuel growth, innovation and efficiency, but failure to harness it can threaten the survival of a business. BDC

Securing the Enterprise

Nothing comes close to security among the top IT priorities for 2022. We saw security incidents rise to the highest level in 17 years, with remote work cited as a factor causing the cost of those breaches to increase. I doubt anyone is shocked to learn that 65% of IT leaders are planning to increase security spending. Gartner says 60% of large organizations will use one or more privacy-enhancing computation techniques by 2025.

What are some of the features helping to provide advanced security protection and manageability for PCs?

• Intel® Hardware Shield¹: A comprehensive hardware-based security which includes:
  • Intel® Threat Detection Technology, which has the industry’s first silicon-enabled AI threat detection. This feature takes advantage of advanced telemetry capabilities by augmenting ISV solutions to help stop ransomware and cryptomining attacks.
  • Intel® Control-Flow Enforcement Technology, which is hardware-based protection against multiple classes of attacks, including memory safety-based attacks and increasingly popular control flow subversion techniques.
  • Intel® Total Memory Encryption to encrypt all data at the silicon level to help protect data in memory from cold boot attacks, including physical memory and DIMM removal attacks, and can help mitigate splicing attacks.
• Intel® Active Management Technology (Intel® AMT)² with Intel® Endpoint Management Assistant lets you remotely and more securely access, repair, and maintain your PC fleet.
  • Intel® Remote Secure Erase lets IT remotely wipe a range of solid state drives of client devices supporting AMT.

Hybrid Work: The New Normal

Analyst groups have released their top picks for the technologies and trends for 2022 and, not surprisingly, hybrid workplace remains a key focus. While companies were able to pivot to adapt to remote work environments, the challenge now is building a sustainable model – for employees, customers and IT.

What are some of the priorities and trends impacting a hybrid work world?

• Performance Needed: Employees are putting their PCs through their paces and nothing hampers productivity more than a PC that can’t keep up. PCs with Intel® Evo™ vPro® Platform help deliver business-class performance, seamless collaboration and long battery life.
• Stability Is Essential: No one wants a PC they can’t depend on and employee frustration with their devices impacts productivity and job satisfaction. Devices built on the Intel vPro platform must pass rigorous testing and cross industry validation. And, the Intel® Stable IT Program helps ensure each Intel vPro platform release will be supported and available for at least 15 months.
• Plug into AI Power: IDC’s 2022 future of work predictions says by 2023, 70% of connected workers in task-based roles will use intelligence embedded in adaptive digital workspaces. Intel® Deep Learning Boost lets software makers use AI and machine learning tools without impacting performance.

Experience Matters

Employees will quit – that’s what Forrester research is showing for the 30% of companies that don’t support anywhere-work. Gartner lists “total experience” which combines customer, employee, user and what they call multiexperience as a top strategic trend for 2022.

Enhanced graphics to support rich media and support for multiple monitors, integrated Thunderbolt 4 technology to charge devices or connect devices from a universal port, and integrated Intel Wi-Fi 6 and Intel Wi-Fi 6E (Gig+) for ultra high speed, low latency and reliable connectivity are all key components in helping deliver the experience today’s hybrid workforce needs.

Giving employees a positive user experience when they are working from anywhere has wide ranging business impacts including job satisfaction, productivity and retention.

A Resolution to Keep

We all know New Years resolutions have a bad habit of failing but making a commitment to invest in your business and your skills will pay dividends for years to come. Intel Partner Alliance and Intel Partner University have a range of programs, courses and tools to help you advance your skills and support your business.

Access to talent and skilled resources is a priority for all business so making the investment in skills development is a good idea for everyone this new year.

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¹ – In thin light, Windows-based devices, as measured by testing as of December 1, 2020 on Intel® Core™ i7-1185G7 on industry benchmarks, Representative Usage Guide testing, and unique features, including in comparison to AMD Ryzen 7 Pro 4750U, across 3 key usages: productivity, creation, and collaboration, as well as December 2020 IOActive study (commissioned by Intel) comparing Intel® Hardware Shield security capabilities with corresponding technologies in an AMD Ryzen Pro 4750U. 

Intel® technologies’ features and benefits depend on system configuration and may require enabled hardware, software or service activation.

² – Requires activation and a system with a corporate network connection, an Intel® AMT-enabled chipset, network hardware, and software. For notebooks, Intel® AMT may be unavailable or limited over a host OS-based VPN, when connecting wirelessly, on battery power, sleeping, hibernating, or powered off. Results dependent upon hardware, setup, and configuration. For more information, visit www.intel.ca/technology/vpro/index.htm.

³ -Based on IEEE 802.11ax specification Intel Engineering simulation. 160 MHz channels and Wi-Fi 6/6E technology advantages related to network managed traffic enable lower latencies, more efficient operation, and higher reliability vs. random contention-based traffic of standard Wi-Fi 5 networks. For more information visit www.Intel.com/PerformanceIndex > Connectivity > Wireless.

Intel does not control or audit third-party data.  You should consult other sources to evaluate accuracy.

Performance varies by use, configuration and other factors. Learn more at www.Intel.com/PerformanceIndex​​.  No product or component can be absolutely secure. Your costs and results may vary. Intel technologies may require enabled hardware, software or service activation. © Intel Corporation.  Intel, the Intel logo, and other Intel marks are trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries.  Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.