The document proposes an Emerging Technology Canvas (ETAC) framework to analyze emerging technologies. It is inspired by the Business Model Canvas and aims to provide a compact visual representation to capture the narrative around an emerging technology. The ETAC seeks to find the right questions to analyze technologies and understand their environment, impact, drivers, future potential and risks through a set of factors. It is presented as a tool to critically evaluate technologies and communicate insights about their adoption and development. Guidelines are provided on how to build an ETAC analysis and contribute insights to an online repository.

1. Vice President, Research, WSO2
A Visual Canvas for Judging New
Technologies
Srinath Perera
Work done in collaboration with Paul Fremantle (paul@wso2.com), Frank Leymann
(frank@wso2.com), and Joanne Jenkins (joanne.jenkins@port.ac.uk).

2. Technology
landscape is
always shifting

3. Emerging technologies are the
culprit
● Creating Segments
○ Web, Wifi,Touch Screen, Cloud,
Opensource
● Transforming Segments
○ Virtual machines -> Containers
○ Encyclopedia -> Wikipedia
○ Telegraph -> Telephone -> Mobile
Phone -> Smart Phone
○ Floppy Drive-> USB, CD -> DVD
○ LCD LED displays -> CRT
○ Taxi -> Car sharing

4. Not all Emerging
Technologies are
created equal

5. Understanding ETs: History

6. This happens yearly,
but there is no
widely accepted way to do it

7. We propose Emerging Technology
Canvas (ETAC)
● A framework for us to analyze technologies
● Goals
○ Finding right questions
○ Narrative to connect those questions
○ Compact, visual representation
● Inspired by “Business Model Canvas”
○ Designed to capture a business model
narrative
○ https://strategyzer.com/canvas/business-mo
del-canvas

8. Can it be
done with
reasonable
effort?
Is there real
impact?
Net positive
drivers
Future & risks
Narrative

11. ● Tries to capture the environment
● A solution to a problem later
becomes a larger trend
○ E.g. Blockchain started as
digital currency
● Drivers are macro level forces
that aid or limits the technology

13. ● Impact from many
angles
● Macro looks at industry
as a whole
○ Network effects +
Critical mass
■ E.g. APIs -> Apps ->
APIs
○ Interactions
● Micro look at a single
organization

14. ● Explore the gap between promised
and current technology
● Explore ecosystem development
○ Can it help wide adoption?
■ Tools and developers
● Friction is technical behavior that’s
unlikely fixed due to technology
○ Many mistrust AI due to its potential to
replace jobs

15. ● Concepts
○ Dominant design, EU technical readiness framework, Gartner hype cycle
○ Rogers’ Five Factors which analyse adoption rates: Relative Advantage,
Compatibility, Simplicity, Trialability, Observability
○ Network effects and critical mass
○ Megatrends (e.g. digitization, urbanization, globalization ...)
○ Specific technology trends (e.g. cloud computing)
○ The capital requirement, production costs, and delivery models.
○ Dependencies of the technology on other building blocks

17. What can you do with ETAC?
Critically analyze emerging
technology
As a tool for education
As a brainstorm tool to discuss
technologies (especially their
impact)
As a tool for communicating
your thoughts about emerging
technology

18. How to build your own analysis with ETAC
● Define the technology.
● Literature review to answer the questions asked by the ETAC.
It creates findings and observations.
● In the Future and Summary sections, we draw conclusions
from findings and observations.
○ Techniques discussed in "Future Section"
● Create the canvas and supporting documents to discusses
your arguments.

19. Contribute to
ETAC at github
https://github.com/wso2/ETAC/

20. Serverless outlook based on ETAC
is coming in November
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updates and exclusive preprints

21. THANK YOU
wso2.com

22. Backup Slides

23. Jump to the Next Curve with Devops
Enterprises are adopting
devops over routine ops at a
rapid rate. The primary
objectives of adopting devops
are to increase agility and to
save more cycles so
corporates can pay more
attention toward innovation.
Over time, WSO2 has gained
an immense amount of
devops experience by running
their own cloud and helping
customers become successful
in their own cloud platforms.

25. ● Landscape and market forces shape technology competition
○ With the added complexity that the landscape changes very fast
● Global Market Outlook (internal use)
○ Categorize middleware into segments and subsegments and estimate their
sizes and growth
● Global Technology Outlook (externally published)
○ A yearly critical review of emerging tech
● Goals
○ Internal understanding and planning
○ Sharing how we think about current and future markets
○ A means for dialog and feedback
CTO Office

26. Middleware Landscape (Market Outlook)
● We identified seven segments
○ Apps
○ Integration - ESB, APIs, Messaging, Workflows
○ Observability
○ Storage - RDBMS & NoSQL
○ Infrastructure - DevOps and Orchestration
○ Security
○ IoT
● We did an exercise to estimate their size and growth (CAGR)

27. ObservabilityApps Integration
AI & Analytics
Infrastructure
Security
Middleware Landscape
Application
Platforms
4.5(7%)
aPaas
ESB
Data
Integration
Analytics
AI
Storage
Data
Center
Automation
IoT
IMG
iPaas
API iSaaS
APM
Log
Analytics
DevOps
iDaaS
Access
Management
Security
Analytics
PIM
iDaaS
Legend
Growth>20%
10%<Growth <20%
Growth<10%
Increasing Growth
Decreasing Growth
Stream
Processing
CIAM
2B(25%)
1B(50%) 3.5(2%) 2.5(5%)
1B(50%) 1B(50%)
4B(25%) 3B(25%)
25(5%)
3B(5%) 40B(10%)
2.0(5%) 2B(34%)
0.5B
(30%)
3B(5%)
1B
(50%)
1B(30%) 1.5B(40%) 1.5B(20%)
Container
Orchestration

28. Interactions Between Segments
IoT
Integration
InfrastructureStorage
Security
AI&Analytics
Observability
Apps

29. Emerging Technologies (ET) Shapes the Landscape
IoT
Integration
InfrastructureStorage
Security
AI&Analytics
Observability
Apps
Sharing
Economy
3D Printing
Fintech
ServiceMesh
Serverless
Blockchain
Quantum
Computing
Chatbots
AR/VR

30. Understanding ETs: Gartner Hype Cycle

31. Understanding ETs: Carlota Perez Framework

32. ServiceMesh
Serverless
BlockChain
AR/VR
Chatbots
Quantum
Computing
3DPrinting
Sharing
Economy
Fintech
IoT
AI&Analytics
Apps
Security
Integration
Observability
Infra&Cloud
Storage
Cost Saving Agility,
& Productivity
Automation
Communication,
Integration, and
Trust
Loose Coupling
Between Entitle
Lack of
Programmers
Privacy
Government
Policy and Law
Complexity
Security
Monopoly/
Vendor Lock-in

33. ServiceMesh
Serverless
BlockChain
AR/VR
Chatbots
Quantum
Computing
3DPrinting
Sharing
Economy
Fintech
IoT
AI&Analytics
Apps
Security
Integration
Observability
Infra&Cloud
Storage
Cost Saving Agility,
& Productivity
Automation
Communication,
Integration, and
Trust
Loose Coupling
Between Entitle
Lack of
Programmers
Privacy
Government
Policy and Law
Complexity
Security
Monopoly/
Vendor-Lock-in
Cost savings is the
key driver!
Everything
drives
integration