DEVOPSdigest

As part of the 2022 DevOps Predictions list, DEVOPSdigest asked industry experts — from analysts and consultants to users and the top vendors — how they think Kubernetes and containers will evolve and impact business in 2022.

KUBERNETES: HOTTEST OPEN SOURCE PROJECT OF 2022

Open source software will continue to grow, containerized or cloud-native software is going to top development investment bringing an increased adoption of Kubernetes. The need for faster container-based deployments at scale and automation will make Kubernetes the hottest open source project in 2022.
Javier Perez
Chief Evangelist — Open Source & API Management, Perforce Software(link is external)

KUBERNETES ADOPTION GROWS

Following the rapid move to the cloud and years of proven ROI in smaller-scale projects, Kubernetes will continue to spread within mainstream enterprises in 2022. Kubernetes will take a vital role in the enterprise platform tech stack, as new use cases such as machine learning, edge computing, and IoT become more broadly adopted. Organizations are scaling and expanding Kubernetes deployments to meet emerging business needs while driving innovation. DIY internal technology platforms are migrating to Kubernetes as a service as organizations move from deployments to production environments.
Tobi Knaup
Co-Founder and CEO, D2iQ(link is external)

Containers Support cloud explosion of 2021

Businesses wrongly predicted that employees would return to the office, as normal, in 2021. Instead, remote working continued, and companies were forced to develop long-term remote working strategies to ensure efficiency, sustainability and to retain employees seeking flexibility. This remote work strategy demanded cloud-based solutions, resulting in an explosion of cloud service adoption. To meet this moment, containers will become mainstream in 2022, making the generational shift to cloud much easier and more streamlined for organizations.
Danny Allan
CTO, Veeam(link is external)

Moving into 2022, more customers will start defining their cloud infrastructure with Kubernetes and deploying it in production. Currently, adoption is still in the beginning stages especially for large-scale deployments, but the trend will accelerate as more and more organizations implement Kubernetes as their primary IT platform. Additionally, the types of applications that move into Kubernetes will also be more varied, including a mix of traditional business applications built around databases, and emerging applications built around AL/ML and data analytics.
Kirby Wadsworth
CMO, ionir(link is external)

More SaaS, More Containers

When it comes to 2022 focus, abstracting the complexities of your infrastructure will be the name of the game. We know containers provide scalability, portability, extensibility and availability advantages, and technologies like Kubernetes alleviate the pain around building, delivering, and scaling containerized apps. Now as the SaaS space continues to explode, we'll see even more innovation in the container space over the next year.
Dipti Borkar
Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer, Ahana(link is external)

RISE OF THE KUBEMASTER

The great irony of Kubernetes is that while Kubernetes was created to make the management of modern cloud applications easier, it is incredibly difficult to manage in and of itself. In order to help manage this complexity, in 2022 we will see the rise of the role of KubeMaster. The KubeMaster is an expert in the overall management and operation of a Kubernetes environment. They are responsible for app dev operations, security, compliance, Kubernetes cluster operations and monitoring and logging. The KubeMaster will play a critical role in the success of modernization initiatives in the coming year.
Haseeb Budhani
CEO, Rafay(link is external)

KUBERNETES COST REDUCTION

The CNCF's recent FinOps for Kubernetes report makes it clear that cloud spend is ballooning. With much of that spend due to cluster overprovisioning, developer and DevOps teams will focus on Kubernetes cost reduction in 2022 and prioritize proactive strategies that can curb escalating costs within their organizations. Where cost monitoring and visibility is poor (particularly so in multi-tenant environments), overprovisioning has been the natural result. Watch for DevOps and developer teams to take the reins for their organizations by making cost monitoring a default tactic in 2022 and implementing showback, chargeback, and hybrid methods. By leading these initiatives, DevOps and developer teams will bring their organizations real-time visibility and management over Kubernetes costs in 2022, and meaningfully improve efficiency as a result.
Kirby Drumm
Field Engineering Lead, Kubecost(link is external)

KUBERNETES SPRAWL

The establishment of Kubernetes as the platform of choice for the deployment and efficient management of most enterprise workloads — at least directionally — is no longer a question. However, the variety of Kubernetes offerings available (across cloud providers and private or so called "hybrid" offerings) has only increased. With the ease of deployment of Kubernetes clusters also decreasing, the stage is well set for "sprawl" problems of the same variety that we have been seeing for multiple cloud accounts, and prior to that for VMs in the virtualized infrastructure world. This will make the ability to manage the lifecycle and applications on these differing Kubernetes providers in a consistent manner, as well as the ability to consolidate them easily, more and more critical.
Reza Shafii,
VP of Product, Kong(link is external)

DEVELOPER BURN OUT

Growing Kubernetes adoption will place more stress on developers and architects. For instance, our annual survey of developers and IT leaders found that 23% of developers feel burnt out from working with Kubernetes. The right technology and training will be required to effectively manage production-scale Kubernetes workloads. Investments in infrastructure, training and resources will increase to combat the burnout rates to ensure organizations realize the full potential and impact of Kubernetes. Without the right technology and expertise in place, complexity challenges will kill Kubernetes deployments in Day 2 production environments.
Tobi Knaup
Co-Founder and CEO, D2iQ(link is external)

SERVICE MESH BECOMES THE NORM FOR KUBERNETES

The service mesh will solidify its role as a critical component of the cloud native stack. In 2022, service mesh adoption will continue to cross the chasm from early adopters to majority adoption within the cloud native ecosystem. There will be a widespread realization that "just throw it on Kubernetes" is not enough for a functioning cloud native application, and that the addition of a service mesh solves fundamental concerns about security, observability, and reliability. In 2022, the service mesh will become the norm, not the exception, for Kubernetes applications.
William Morgan
Creator of Service Mesh Linkerd and CEO, Buoyant(link is external)

KUBERNETES CONSOLIDATION

Expect to see more all-in-one Kubernetes stacks offered as individual players are acquired or merge with others. This industry consolidation makes it all the more important for companies to choose open and flexible Kubernetes platforms to ensure they can maximize customizability, security, and future architecture agility simultaneously. The Kubernetes ecosystem has never been more robust offering integrations with cloud vendors and related best in class tools, and open-source approaches ensure future-proof support.
Oleg Chunikhin
Co-Founder and CTO, Kublr(link is external)

Container Complexity Will Limit Adoption for Production Workloads

Container are continuing to make the headlines and are destined to be used in more use cases throughout the IT infrastructure. The benefits of containers are proven in DevOps environments but their complexity, coupled with constraints on IT resources and the complex architecture of many applications, databases, and ERP systems will limit their adoption in production environments. Companies will continue to run complex applications, databases, and ERPs in traditional on-premises and cloud environments.
Cassius Rhue
VP, Customer Experience, SIOS Technology(link is external)

CLOUD-NATIVE CAUSES MOVE AWAY FROM KUBERNETES

Cloud-native will continue to grow and evolve, with Kubernetes as one of its casualties. Without a doubt, Kubernetes provided the world with two main benefits: making it possible to operate containerized applications and making those applications portable between different clouds. Regardless, operating Kubernetes is complex and requires expertise, even when that substrate is managed by the cloud provider. Function platforms, like AWS Lambda or Azure Functions, abstract away many of the infrastructure management complexities that SREs must contend with when dealing with Kubernetes-orchestrated applications. It is true that functions platforms lock the customer into specific clouds but their relative simplicity will prompt a movement away from Kubernetes as customers progressively adopt cloud-native architectures.
Amir Sharif
VP of Product and Marketing, Opsani(link is external)

KUBERNETES IS CHALLENGED

It's been over five years since the last disruptive innovation in infrastructure (with Docker/containers). 2022 may be the year that a new disruptive infrastructure technology rears its head to challenge the dominance of Kubernetes (which has grown exceedingly complex).
Julian Dunn
Director of Product Marketing, PagerDuty(link is external)

Go to: 2022 Low-Code/No-Code Predictions