The relatively rapid adoption by government organizations of big data analytics, cloud computing social business and mobility is expected to propel the use of “smart strategies” in 2013, according to a leading research group.

IDG Government Insights, in its annual “Top 10 Predictions” for government information technology in 2013, predicted as a result that more than 40% of U.S. local governments will be in research and evaluation stage for “smart city” pilots/projects and 50% will begin implementation in 2013.

In addition, “the coming year will present significant changes in government and commercial partnerships to achieve mutual goals,” predicted Thom Rubel, vice president, IDC Government Insights.

“I think the big news here is what’s happening with devices and data in government,”said Rubel. “Although it’s all about operational efficiency and mission outcomes, government organizations really need to focus on device and solution ‘best use’ — in other words, those things that they need to support the government workforce in carrying out their mission in the most effective ways,” he said.

“As they do that, there will be big implications for how and what they buy, as well as the impacts those choices will have on how they interact with, share, analyze, and store information. It will be a changed game,” he said.

Here are IDC Government Insight’s Top 10 predictions for 2013:

• Prediction 1 – Infrastructure consolidation will hit its peak as governments accelerate cloud adoption by over 50% over 2012 levels, accounting for over 7% of all government IT spending.

• Prediction 2 – Tactical deployments of big data solutions will grow by over 30% CAGR and will accelerate broader pervasive analytics deployment, laying the foundation for “smart government.”

• Prediction 3 – Agencies/organizations/offices will rapidly begin to rationalize and establish baseline costs for IT assets and identify endpoint device choices – PCs, tablets, and smart phones – for “best use.”

• Prediction 4 – Mobile devices and apps, smart sensors, cloud computing solutions, and citizen-facing portals will create a 48% increase in digital information, creating new records management access and retrieval issues.

• Prediction 5 – Cloud sharing/collaboration among governments (federal, state, and local) and shared services will account for 18% of the government cloud market and create new business models for IT procurement and provisioning.

• Prediction 6 – Though they continue to lag behind other industries in investing in social business software, 35% of government organizations will initiate social analytics tools evaluation and/or implementation.

• Prediction 7 – All levels of government will accelerate mobile applications development. In 2013, 35% of new federal and state applications will be mobile and 45% of new local applications will be mobile.

• Prediction 8 – Over 40% of U.S. local governments will be in the research and evaluation stage for Smart City pilots/projects and 50% of these will begin some level of implementation in 2013.

• Prediction 9 – Government organizations that promote open data will foster 25% more private commercial activity in apps and services that will facilitate improved outcomes across a range of government goals.

• Prediction 10 – Public/private partnerships will be redefined based on mutual mission goals and outcomes that create mutual government/commercial partnership and research benefits.