Over the next three years, global organizations will make understanding and interacting with the customer their top priority. So says a new study from The Economist Intelligence Unit titled, “Voice of the customer: Whose job is it, anyway?” Yet only 56 percent of respondents to the survey, sponsored by SAS, believe their companies clearly understand the customer today.

As water increasingly becomes one of the world’s most precious resources, IBM scientists are working with Arad Group, a world leader in reliable water meter systems, to help water companies and utilities around the globe provide more effective and efficient management of drinking water through the use of big data and advanced analytics technology.

The converging and mutually reinforcing social, cultural and technological factors in the Nexus of Forces (cloud, mobility, social and information) are driving a radical power shift away from the culture of the enterprise and toward that of the consumer. “Cool Vendors” are exploiting this nexus to challenge long-held assumptions and affect IT investment, according to Gartner, Inc. Gartner’s 2013 Cool Vendors research series identifies the innovative companies, products and services that will shape business and consumer strategies in the future.