Computing. There was a time, when computing was a terminal on one end, and a server on the other end. Users didn’t know or care about what needed to happen to make everything work. That computing is a black box means users must put up with the performance. Digital transformation and the quest to enhance customer experience at the endpoint have opened the door for edge computing technology.
Edge computing puts computing, storage, and intelligence close to where it’s needed, allowing firms to design and deploy software flexibly between central, distributed, and local sites. These solutions help tech stakeholders anticipate customer needs, act on their behalf, and operate businesses efficiently, often in Internet of Things (IoT) contexts.
Michele Pelino, principal analyst at Forrester acknowledges that edge computing is not new, and it means something different to each type of vendor offering an edge solution. She recalls that in the past, edge computing was focused on telco networks or data centre-focused technology solutions.
Pelino says Edge has moved away from being a telco and IoT footnote to becoming an important technology component to address a wide range of use cases in many environments. Different vendors are using it to represent entirely different solutions.
Industry use cases
There are many reasons enterprise stakeholders use edge computing technology and services. These benefits are often aligned with the ability to address the requirements of specific edge use cases.
According to Pelino, financial services and insurance, and high-tech manufacturing firms are the leading vertical markets adopting edge networking infrastructure.
She recalls that in financial services, high-frequency trading (HFT) and hedge fund firms can reduce latency by deploying on-premises edge servers placed as close to the trading floor as possible to minimise latency or to reduce last-mile data delays between servers collocated at different exchanges, enabling maximum profits on high-volume low-margin trades.
In manufacturing, she cites one key use case is for predictive maintenance to analyse and detect changes in equipment, machinery or operational processes before a failure occurs. “Edge computing brings data, analytics processing, and storage closer to the equipment to monitor machine health in real-time,” says Pelino.
Other relevant edge use cases in manufacturing include optimising robotics, drones, or autonomous guided vehicles to complete key industrial operations functions.
In retail, edge sensors, cameras, and AI-powered video analytics create smart shelves which monitor and optimise stock and shelf capacity in real time; transform point-of-sale systems to engage customers; reduce inventory loss; or provide personalised wayfinding for customers to reduce waiting times.
Smart building use cases are also becoming common, as they often use edge technologies to automate, control, and optimise critical building systems (e.g., heating, ventilation, lighting) or for environmental monitoring (e.g. air quality, temperature, humidity) to address sustainability goals and employee comfort.
Delivering the highest value for users in Asia
Asked which technologies facilitating edge services deliver the most significant value for users of the technology in Asia, Pelino clarifies that enabling each edge use case requires a specific technology stack that addresses the edge environment, use case latency and bandwidth requirements, and the applications and workloads enabled at the edge locations.
The value each type of technology provides is based on the technology elements necessary to support specific edge use cases. For example:
IoT solutions often demand connectivity, processing, and storage at the edge sensor or gateway level and connect back to the core using shared, and potentially intermittent networks. Autonomous vehicles or real-time predictive analytics require low-latency infrastructure enabled by emerging 5G networks to ensure health-impacting and mission-critical applications.
In other edge examples, second- and third-tier data centres, colocation facilities, cloud gateways, and WANs interconnect infrastructure and software systems back to the enterprise’s core data centres and cloud gateways to enable use cases including office automation, smart buildings, video surveillance, and e-commerce applications.
Other edge use cases leverage globally distributed compute clusters to deploy high-performance applications and commercialise them for consumers, employees, and remote workers, wherever they are. These solutions can cache content for rich websites, enable personalisation, and power geo-specific applications.
Biggest barriers to edge technology adoption in Asia
Pelino acknowledges that security is often identified as the biggest barrier to edge computing deployment. She explains that the diverse array of edge devices, use cases, and environments makes it harder for firms to address security.
“This concern is exacerbated by the fact that attackers can gain access to edge environments via standard application flaws, network misconfigurations, insecure protocols, or physical access to the device itself,” she continued.
Every new network connection, smart device, edge server, or micro data centre is an attack surface for hackers. She suggests that the optimal way to address security concerns is to implement a Zero Trust edge architecture to bring networking and security together, starting on-premises with SD-WAN, firewalls, and Zero Trust network access and ending with routing, secure web gateways, and cloud security gateways in the cloud.
Pelino also cites the fragmented vendor landscape as another barrier. She elaborates that the edge computing landscape comprises a diverse set of technologies and solutions that, when managed together, address key business scenarios, workloads, and use cases.
Many different types of vendors participate in the edge computing market (e.g., chip makers, CDNs, telcos, industrial equipment vendors, IT technology vendors, colocation vendors, and public cloud providers).
She explains that the value position of each type of vendor varies according to edge services, capabilities, and business scenarios. She adds that because the edge landscape is so diverse, no single vendor will provide and support all technologies for any edge business scenario.
“Vendor-to-vendor and vendor-to-enterprise partnerships are critical to creating a complete edge solution,” she continues.
This diversity of the vendor ecosystem introduces another barrier: ensuring collaboration and ownership among IT and OT stakeholders. Pelino explains that often the many owners of edge use cases operate on an island with separate initiatives from the IT and OT teams.
She suggests that tech executives break down these IT and OT silos. “Some enterprises bring IT and OT teams into a common reporting line while others cross-train OT experts in IT disciplines such as DevOps and data ops,” she elaborates.
“In either case, the goal is a mutual understanding of critical processes and culture. Tech executives must also understand who owns the edge strategy at large, and the individual owners of each aspect of edge. The last mile will be connecting edge and cloud strategies as rarely can these operate independently,” she concludes.
