As we enter a new year, our team has made predictions for the coming year in the Cloud Native ecosystem.

Kubernetes - Kunal Kushwaha

2022 was the year that Kubernetes went mainstream. Civo research found that 51% of cloud developers are now using Kubernetes and/or containers in their operations, with 57% having noticed an increase in the number of Kubernetes clusters their organization is running in the last 12 months.

Going into 2023, I expect organizations to grow more ambitious in how they use Kubernetes. We will see developers build on established use cases like infrastructure management and microservices into new and ambitious fields like machine learning and edge computing.

It's also possible that we’ll see the variety of environments Kubernetes is deployed across increase. Due to its inherent open source nature, Kubernetes is often associated with public cloud, but as its benefits become more widely recognized, Kubernetes will likely be deployed across on-premise and data center infrastructure as well.

Cloud cost/simplicity - Mark Boost

The cost of cloud has grown increasingly unmanageable for organizations of all sizes. Opaque bills that make it difficult to predict how much you’re going to be charged at the end of the month are common for hyperscaler customers. Indeed, there’s a whole industry that’s only service is predicting the bills of public cloud providers.

On top of this, hyperscalers are constantly pushing new services that customers don’t necessarily need to drive revenue. Our research found that 76% of developers noticed increased cloud costs in 2022, something that will likely only be exacerbated by growing economic pressures.

To offset this, we’ll see organizations look to simplify their cloud services in 2023, only paying for the tools that they require, from simplified and fair providers.

eBPF - Saiyam Pathak

Over the past year, we saw real growth in eBFP, specifically in the network, observability, and security fields. It is being used in newer and more advanced tools, such as tracee, pixie, Falco, aya, Katran, sidecarless service mesh, Cilium, Pyroscope, and parca, to provide more accurate and efficient results.

Companies like Solo, Isovalent, and Groundcover are leading the way in eBPF innovation. However, if you are looking to learn more, resources such as Cilium labs, solo courses and workshops, and ebpf.io are available to learn more.

Future of work - Mark Boost

A trend we’ve seen gather pace during 2022 is the introduction of a four-day working week. Many have struggled to switch off and end their workday when working from home, accelerating concerns around burnout culture. Adapting to a four-day week gives your team more opportunity to engage with life outside of the office and prioritize their mental health.

As a whole, this trend looks set to continue, and advances in workplace AI is making these ventures more successful. We’ve seen no drop in productivity in our own four-day working week initiatives, and with bigger companies like Unilever adopting their own version, more and more organizations are likely to take the plunge. So over 2023, I expect we’ll see employers take more steps to show they’re engaging with the concerns of their staff and putting team wellbeing first.

Automation/AI - Dinesh Majrekar

Towards the end of 2022, we’ve seen an increased awareness of the possibilities of AI – most recently, the potential for low/no code when coupled with AI. The solutions enable “citizen developers” – business users who can’t write code with programming languages, such as python – to create useful applications using low/no-code tools. If successful, these initiatives could free up IT teams to work on creative solutions and focus on business growth.

The exploration of these solutions is likely to continue into 2023 and beyond as the industry tests the limits of what can be achieved with automation – especially when coupled with the ease of low/no-code solutions. As we move into an increasingly digital workplace, using AI to guide nonprogrammers as they develop individual services holds endless possibilities for enterprise productivity.

WASM - Saiyam Pathak

The usage of WebAssembly (WASM) is expected to see significant growth as it is increasingly being adopted for production use cases and in the cloud native environment. Projects such as Runwasi and Docker, which simplify the process of running WASM modules, will further drive its adoption. Companies like Suborbital, Fermyon, and Cosmonic are worth keeping an eye on as they are actively involved in the development of WASM technology.

Start-up trends - Mark Boost

Start-ups have faced unprecedented pressures in 2022, with the darkening economic outlook forcing businesses to make tough decisions to stay afloat. Many will head into 2023 in survival mode, focused on keeping their heads above water until the outlook improves. Founders need to balance this impulse against a continued focus on building for the long-term. The best founders adapt to moments of crisis, looking for ways to optimise and enhance business performance using technology. With budgets under pressure more than ever before, users need to be won over to spend. In this frenetic climate, start-ups have a great opportunity to innovate and seize a leadership role for themselves that stands out from the crowd.

New & emerging technology - Josh Mesout

2023 is the year we see companies pivot to focus on value and cost being the primary decision makers for cloud investment. As all industries mature their existing cloud infrastructure, considerations such as time to deliver return on investment and increased competitor velocity will drive organizations to look for ways to stand out amongst the pack.

Emerging technologies such as AI and Blockchain are now within the reach of most businesses with adoption exploding in areas where customers can easily assess these technologies to their problems and produce practical solutions.

Edge computing continues to be the exception to the rule, providing new flexible adoption pathways to cloud adoption, hybrid cloud and multi cloud. To many it's already clear the benefits of having the point of processing closer to the data storage, helping to reduce latency and providing better security. On top of this, the proximity greatly reduces the cost of data transfer between hardware, something that will be of growing importance during the recession in 2023.

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Alternatively, if you are interested in reading about more predictions for 2023, Saiyam Pathak has shared a blog about what he thinks will be highlighted throughout the year: