Reflections, Edge Computing 2022

Last week we took a team of ten to the Edge Computing Expo in Santa Clara, CA. The conference had excellent speakers and an array of companies spanning the edge industry. We saw hardware, AI software, and even Boston Dynamics' favorite yellow dog. 

Complexity is Still the Norm

What stuck out to us was the number of companies still looking for product market fit. Like early cloud computing, the edge computing industry is still young. Although early industry leaders are emerging, most companies are yet to find a solid product-market fit. We see plenty of investment in edge infrastructure, but moving the edge beyond DIY is still in its early stages. Today, there are few solutions that abstract away the complexity of edge to make development easy.

Mind-Blowing Growth Projections

In a recent report, 451 Research or S&P Global predicted a 85% CAGR for the edge IaaS market over the next five years, bringing the industry to $29.9 billion compared to the $738 million earned in 2021. Critical to meeting this industry valuation is our collective ability to offer easier-than-cloud solutions. Let's face it, for most use cases, cloud is sufficient. Therefore to entice more companies to benefit from edge, we need more than cool sensors and servers in every city; we need to make edge easy for every developer to access. 

Easier Than Cloud

At the Edge Computing Expo, one could get the impression that edge exists in a vacuum. However, it does not. Instead, it exists in a gradient between on-prem, edge, and cloud. Market leaders will inevitably be those that offer solutions across the spectrum.

My impression at the expo was that the edge's accessibility for those outside of the 10% of highly technical early adopters is still limited. Closing the edge-to-market gap requires more than just infrastructure. It requires that edge is easier than cloud. 

Jaxon Repp, Harper's Head of Product, speaking to Jake Cohen about Harper at the Edge Computing Expo.

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About Harper

Harper's globally distributed database and application platform is orders of magnitude faster and more flexible than last-generation alternatives. Spanning the spectrum of delivery options, Harper is a vendor-agnostic solution giving developers the power to deploy anywhere from the cloud to the edge and even on-prem. With built-in cross-planet table level pub/sub, your data is always up to date across the globe regardless of vendor, ensuring near-zero global latency. Additionally, with Harper's lightning-fast memory map and high throughput potential, most companies reduce their infrastructure costs by at least 50% by switching to Harper. 

If you are interested in learning more, request a demo.