8. Hyper-converged Infrastructure Will Mature

The hyper-converged infrastructure market, while fast-growing, is still characterized by the startup nature of its vendors. Yes, there is VMware, but that company early last year killed its original product line, EVO:Rail, and is now pushing hard to bring its VxRail, VxRack and VSAN lines to market dominance. And yes, there is Nutanix, but since its IPO that company has seen losses grow with revenue. Nearly everyone else is in startup growth mode.

Something has to give. 2017 has already seen a big change with HPE's planned acquisition of SimpliVity. Look for a couple other vendors to drop out or get acquired, all part of the natural progression of a new technology that has already proven it has legs. Now to see which vendors have legs.