Big Data: why are professionals in this field of study so demanded?
Friday, 22 May 2020
The Bachelor of Science with Honours in Big Data Analytics programme is designed by the School of Computer Science and Applied Mathematics at the University of the Witwatersrand to blend multi-disciplinary subjects together and to provide students with the research and professional skills to master and design smart technologies.
What is Big Data?
“Big Data” captures the idea of managing vast amounts of data using a variety of modern computing technologies and infrastructure from a variety of different sources. To manage, develop and understand the required technologies, people trained in the intersection of subjects ranging from statistics, information and computer science, system design and social sciences are needed. There are individuals who are able to leverage emerging technologies and interact with interdisciplinary teams of specialists.
Big Data is a phrase used to mean a massive volume of both structured and unstructured data that is so large it is difficult to process using traditional database and software techniques. In most enterprise scenarios the volume of data is too big or it moves too fast or it exceeds current processing capacity.
Why are Big Data and skilled professionals in this field so important?
The importance of big data lies in the fact that it allows companies to collect large amounts of data and analyze it so that the company can use it for their own benefit. The more efficiently a company uses its data, the more potential it has to grow. The main reason why companies need big data professionals is that they will bring about many benefits for the company. Some of the benefits are:
- Reducing costs: thanks to Big Data, companies are able to identify more efficient ways of doing business.
- Time reduction: The high speed of tools like Hadoop and in-memory analytics can easily identify new sources of data which helps businesses analyze data immediately and make quick decisions based on the learnings.
- New Product Development: it is extremely important to know the trends of customer needs and satisfaction through analytics because it helps companies create products according to the wants of customers.
- Understand the market conditions: analyzing big data can help you improve your understanding of current market trends. You can get ahead of your competitors if you analyze customers’ purchasing behaviours because you can find out which are the products that sell the most.
- Control online reputation: Big data can also analyze customers’ responses about your product or your company because it can do sentiment analysis. This will enable you to improve the online presence of your business.
Why study the Bachelor with Honours in Big Data Analytics offered by the University of the Witwatersrand?
Skilled professionals in the field of big data analytics are highly demanded because companies have become aware of its importance. Since the demand highly exceeds the supply, skilled professionals’ salaries increase more and more because their jobs are of paramount importance.
If you study this Bachelor with Honours in Big Data Analytics offered by the University of the Witwatersrand, you will acquire a deep understanding of this extremely useful field of study. Also, you will develop important skills that will help you when performing your job, such as discussion, decision making, and analytical thinking.
The Bachelor of Science with Honours in the field of Big Data Analytics offered by the University of the Witwatersrand is a 1 year full-time degree. It was established in response to the needs of both industry and of the scientific community, where massive demand for highly skilled data scientists has emerged.