Big Data is not a business jargon now. It is becoming a necessity. To remain competitive in the market, you have to make use of Big Data. Now, you can not ignore it. So, we SEE a POSITIVE upward trend in the adoption of Big Data across different verticals.

The use cases may be different for different industries. Previously it was only the private industries that were utilizing the power of Big Data. But nowadays we see the government organizations are also adopting Big Data.  The Big Data adoption in different enterprises is for different reasons.

Some of these are mentioned below:

1. To improve control over waste management, fraud detection, and abuse
2. To make efficient resource management
3. To formulate future strategies and budgeting
4. To predict equipment failures etc.

There are certain challenges in the adoption of Big Data that needs to be properly addressed. Some of these challenges are:

1. Initial capital investment
2. Change in culture
3. Change in business practices
4. Change in operations etc.

Many governments, as well as private organizations, have already invested heavily in their IT infrastructure before the emergence of Big Data. So making a sudden adoption of Big Data is reluctant. Many organizations have their data stored in silos. There were also no strategies and established practices for the extraction and processing of that data. So making full use of the data was also not possible due to different formats and protocols. The awareness regarding Big Data integration was little and the reluctance to change was high. Most of them want to adopt a wait and watch strategy. So, initially, we saw a slow adoption in Big Data and allied technologies. But nowadays the trend has shifted and we see wants to have some KIND of Big Data adoption in their enterprises.

The Big Data solutions that are available also vary widely. A specific Big Data solution that is suitable for one enterprise may be completely unsuitable for the other. So considering these various challenges, it becomes imperative to see the best practices in the adoption of Big Data solutions. Certain factors are conducive to the adoption of Big Data:

1. Leadership that is open-minded and holistic
2. Business needs and objectives must be clearly stated before the implementation of any Big Data technology.
3. Specific business use cases should be identified and aligned with the business objectives.
4. A clear strategy and plan to utilize existing IT resources.
5. A holistic VIEW of the integration plan with the legacy systems.
6. Emphasis on data governance.
7. Employees Awareness and training etc.

Attention should be given on the overall Big Data infrastructure and not just the present required application. While planning for the adoption of Big Data, care should also be taken regarding the proper SIZE of the cluster, requirement of good commodity hardware, storage and network architecture, security and compliance considerations.