Cloud and mobile are set to be businesses’ biggest revenue drivers, according to a KPMG survey of 100 C-suite executives.
Data & Analytics at 51% is projected to be the biggest revenue driver, according to the research, followed by Mobile and Cloud at 41% and 40%, respectively, security at 28%, Internet of Things at 19%, and Consumerisation of IT at 19%.
More than half of the executives said mobile revenues exceeded their revenue targets in 2013 – double the percentage last year, when just 26% found that to be the case.
Meanwhile, 46% said cloud revenues exceeded 2013 forecasts, compared to 28% a year ago.
Gary Matuszak, global chair of KPMG Technology, Media and Telecommunications practice, said: "We are witnessing a convergence of technologies and business opportunity that is producing a flood of revenue in cloud and mobile.
"Also, technology companies are leveraging cloud to transform their business to become more efficient, smarter and flexible."
Half of the repsondents this year expect data and analytics to be the top growth drivers in the next two years, compared with about 33% in 2013 and 19% in 2012.
This reflects huge growth as companies adapt to the challenges and possibilities offered by big data, KPMG claimed.
The mergers and acquisitions (M&A) space also witnessed momentum as access to new technology and products (65%) became the primary driver, the survey found, with 65% of executives citing it as the biggest motivating factor.
Access to new customers/users (49%) is the next big M&A stimulant, followed by access to engineering and other talent (31%), and control over strategic assets to defend against competition (28%).
86% of the executives say that technology innovation to create competitive differentiation will be the top driver of transformation for their business over the next three to five years while 72% gave preference to customer demand.
Investment in automotive technology is poised to be big as nearly 60% of those surveyed say their company will have a special focus on communications convergence/connected car.
About 42% think that technology innovation in preventive care will be the biggest contribution to improve medical care while 40% say innovation in electronic medical records will be the gamechanger.
Only 25% plan to invest in crowd sourcing platforms and programs, while a whopping 55% do not.
Security remains the biggest challenge to businesses adopting Cloud, Mobile or social media technologies and applications, with almost two-thirds hope their company to spend one to five percent of their revenue on information security over the next 12 months.
Biggest revenue generators would be the markets of US, China and UK, the survey noted.
