Big Data

Historically, “big data” has been used to define high growth, access and use of information in a data topology. The term "big data" puts at focus on the volume of data, but that's only part of the story.
 
Worldwide information volume is growing annually at a minimum rate of 59 percent annually, and while volume is a significant challenge in managing big data, business and IT leaders must focus on information volume, variety and velocity.

• Volume: The increase in data volumes within enterprise systems is caused by transaction volumes and other traditional data types, as well as by new types of data. Too much volume is a storage issue, but too much data is also a massive analysis issue.
• Variety: IT leaders have always had an issue translating large volumes of transactional information into decisions — now there are more types of information to analyze — mainly coming from social media and mobile (context-aware). Variety includes tabular data (databases), hierarchical data, documents, e-mail, metering data, video, still images, audio, stock ticker data, financial transactions and more.
• Velocity: This involves streams of data, structured record creation, and availability for access and delivery. Velocity means both how fast data is being produced and how fast the data must be processed to meet demand.

Harnessing the Power of Big Data - Big Data, Integration & Governance Forums 2013

Big data is a significant issue:  
The ability to manage extreme data will be a core competency of enterprises that are increasingly using new forms of information — such as text, social and context.

According to an Economist Intelligence Unit survey, one percent of respondents reported no increase in the amount of data they collected throughout the previous year. The other 99 percent faced increases in the amount and complexity of data it collected. If that's your case, an awareness of recent Big Data developments may be important to your organization.

Some enterprises have learned how to successfully extract valuable insights about customer-driven needs and complex/unknown relationships from their huge databases. Unfortunately, most enterprises still struggle to put all of their valuable data to good use. There is a strong link between successful data management strategies and financial performance that should make this area critical to every organization.