Tech that reduces data lag by is set to grow across region and bring benefits to industrial sector.

A report from data and analytics company GlobalData says the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region is on the cusp of wide-spread edge computing adoption with industry verticals set to benefit.

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It predicts several sectors in the region taking advantage of the technology including manufacturing, which it says could streamline its industrial processes, improve supply chain movements and even operate heavy equipment more autonomously by adopting the technology.

Driven by Japan and China it foresees APAC second only to North America in terms of the edge computing market, with the two nations together accounting for 61 per cent of its revenue stream. It says the market will grow at an annual compound rate of 21 per cent between 2019 and 2024, reaching a $5.8 billion value.

The rise of edge computing has increased exponentially with the surge in connected assets which require greater band-widths that in some cases, the cloud is unable to cope with, producing lag.

It operates by being geographically closer to a data gathering device where computation is carried out locally avoiding a central processing cloud-based location meaning latency issues can be negated.

Its influence is expected to reach beyond industry, working alongside society's rapidly evolving connected devices ecosystem, including the growth of smart cars and smart cities. As larger data volumes are produced then Edge Computing will be expected to produce swift and accurate processing. Shamim Kahn, Senior Technology Analyst at Global Data says Edge Computing has the capability to keep up with the increase. "Edge computing would be key in handling most of these challenges, as decentralised processing would allow for excellent reponse times and reduced latency," he explained.

Several big tech firms have, in recent weeks, stepped-up their development in the technology including Amazon Web Services who updated their 'Snow' family of edge computing; Microsoft announcing Azure Edge Zones; and Google revealing its Global Mobile Edge Cloud strategy.