The Year That Was For The Technology Startups And Software Testing Companies In 2017

Attributed To Avinash Tiwari, Co-Founder And Director, Pcloudy

As per a recent report by Technavio's analysts, the global Mobile App testing services market is predicted to grow at a CAGR of 18.31% during the period 2017-2021. Over the last few years, the mobile application testing market is growing at an exponential rate and is currently a 3.2 Bn USD industry. The app testing market is further estimated to reach 6 Billion USD by 2021.

Trends that ruled the technology startups and software testing market in the year 2017

1. Agile and continuous delivery: The Year 2017 saw an increased trend in agile development cycles, continuous delivery and faster deployments of mobile apps.
2. Improved Focus on Security: There was an improved focus on security. Ordinary users stopped clicking on strange links and started reviewing files before downloading. They look through the small print to get a clear understanding of the app’s permissions and usage of safety protocols, such as two-factor authentication. With that being said, mobile apps still have a lot of security holes which can lead to the loss of personal and financial information.
3. Artificial Intelligence: App/Software testing is a process that constitutes a very fundamental aspect in the area of development.  However, sometimes developers are unable to carry out an exhaustive testing of an application due to the paucity of time and resources. In such a case one can argue the need for a system that could intelligently identify areas that more elaborate and focused attention on the aspects that could be handled through automation based on repetitive patterns. Also, AI bots-based testing requires very little maintenance and are capable of discovering new paths through the product on their own.
4. IOT: Growth of Machine learning and Artificial intelligence is making IOT space more mature and stable.Almost every startup and big companies are launching their IOT product ranging from Smart Thermostat, Smart Door Lock, Smart Jewellery and everything that you can think of are appended to the Smart world. And this Smart world cannot exist without Smartphone applications of course.
5. Extreme test automation: With the advent of continuous integration, continuous testing and continuous deployment, the need for increasing test automation coverage will be at the forefront of this movement. Test execution turnarounds must be faster and bugs must be identified quicker. More importantly, automation of integration testing in development, during iterations sprints will have to be smoothly executed in each cycle of continuous integration.

Forecast for new trends in the technology startups and the software testing sector in 2018

1. IOT Conquest: IOT becoming the Optimus Prime of all others. Software and applications that connect hardware to the Internet or with each other bring great concerns for the IoT project QA team. It’s hard to establish security priorities and define the right testing tools. Any IoT product needs to be tested for its functionality, reliability, and effectiveness.
2. The Merge of Agile & DevOps: The key principle of DevOps ideology is that all departments of an IT company must collaborate seamlessly. The emerging trends in software development shifts towards quality engineering where testing must be more progressive, iterative, and integrated with app making process from the start.
3. Open Source Tools Will Win Over the World: It’s already a fact that more and more companies accept Open Source services for the execution of test management and automation, Agile and DevOps tactics and the defect management.
4. Digital testing will soar: Almost all organizations have begun the digital transformation. Their focus these days is mainly on delivering products to the market in the shortest time possible, giving special attention to QA and testing. Therefore, the digital strategy of these organizations must involve optimizing functional testing across all channels.