Gartner's 2022 China Information and Communications Technology Maturity Curve states that the Metaverse will break the bottleneck that hinders the arrival of the next era of innovation

Gartner's 2022 China Information and Communications Technology Maturity Curve states that the Metaverse will break the bottleneck that hinders the arrival of the next era of innovation

Gartner's "China Information and Communications Technology Maturity Curve 2022" report stated that in order to create digital revenue and improve operational sustainability, chief information officers of Chinese companies should focus on the following four steps: discover new opportunities by enabling digital business, leverage composable architecture to obtain business-oriented information and communications technology (ICT) solutions, improve security and data privacy protection, and improve business agility by modernizing applications and infrastructure.

Since the release of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025) in March 2021, the Chinese government has introduced a number of new regulations and initiatives aimed at achieving sustainable economic growth. These initiatives will inevitably affect the information and communications technology sector. New technologies and practices have become an important innovation engine to help Chinese companies achieve digital transformation through composable architectures.

The production maturity stage focuses on technologies with proven and recognized benefits. As more and more organizations become satisfied with the risk reduction, technology adoption begins to enter a rapid growth stage (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. China’s information and communication technology maturity curve in 2022

Source: Gartner (July 2022)

original universe

The Metaverse and its underlying technologies will break the bottlenecks that are hindering the arrival of the next era of innovation by enabling user experiences and use cases across industries and providing new revenue opportunities.

The current Internet is experiencing a bottleneck - due to a long-term lack of breakthroughs in content, interaction, participation and interoperability, the Internet "cannot achieve breakthrough progress in the process of growth." The Metaverse and its underlying technologies will break the bottleneck that hinders the arrival of the next era of innovation by enabling new user experiences across industries, a variety of different use cases, and providing new investment opportunities. They can also enable people with disabilities to enjoy equality in the digital world.

Cloud Security

In China, the increasing adoption of cloud computing has brought challenges to protecting key digital businesses and assets in the cloud. Cloud security is different from traditional protection technologies that focus on boundaries. It requires enterprises and cloud service providers to work together to take security control measures on cloud resources. Effective and manageable cloud security plays an important role in helping enterprises use the cloud safely and in compliance with regulations.

privacy protection

China regulates privacy under the Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL), which came into effect in November 2021, and is currently developing related cross-industry regulations. While the PIPL has similarities to privacy laws such as the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), it also has significantly different requirements and is enforced under the guidance of multiple regulators.

The Personal Information Protection Law has significantly changed China's legal and regulatory environment. Previously, enforcement was mainly based on the Cybersecurity Law and the Personal Information Security Standard. The Personal Information Protection Law provides a more comprehensive personal data protection framework for Chinese citizens and adds severe economic sanctions - violators will be fined 5% of their annual income in the previous year or RMB 50 million (whichever is higher).

Cloud Native Computing

Cloud native brings speed and agility. Business systems are evolving from enabling business capabilities to strategic digital transformation that accelerates business speed and growth. Enterprises are increasingly required to add speed to market, innovative features, microservices/shared service architecture transformation, and zero downtime to digital initiatives. Cloud native can accelerate time to market, and cloud native features and products have less operational overhead when scaling and running.

Edge computing

Decentralized edge computing will complement highly centralized, hyperscale public clouds. Edge computing solves many pressing problems, such as unacceptable latency and bandwidth requirements due to the massive increase in data at the edge. China is building a large number of edge facilities, including laying a nationwide 5G network, in order to use edge computing to enable hyperscale digital transformation application scenarios at all levels.

Confidential Computing

Confidential computing is a secure mechanism for executing code in hardware-based trusted execution environments (TEEs, also known as enclaves). These enclaves not only isolate and protect code and data from the host system and its owners, but also ensure code integrity and authentication.

In order to activate the value of data through data exchange and processing, China designated data as a production factor in 2020. The entry into force of China's Data Security Law (DSL) and Personal Information Protection Law (PIPL) has prompted companies to seek data protection.

Confidential computing can alleviate a major barrier to cloud adoption for highly regulated enterprises concerned about data on public clouds being accessed by unauthorized third parties. Confidential computing allows enterprises to enhance protection of data in use at the hardware level from competitors, data processors, and data analysts in ways that traditional cryptographic techniques cannot. When applied to Internet of Things (IoT)/edge servers or nodes, confidential computing can protect data and enterprise applications closer to the source of the data.

Gartner clients can read the "China Information and Communications Technology Hype Cycle 2022" for more information.