Following on from my blog at the beginning of the year entitled "Predictions for 2008" which predicted that Complex Event Processing (CEP) would be a hot topic this year, IBM has moved already in to play in this market by their acquisition today of AptSoft. With the growth in SOA and business process management as well as some verticals such as manufacturing, logistics, retail and pharmaceuticals all investing in RFIDs we are set for an explosion of events on a scale we have never seen before in commercial business. Because of potentially significant business benefits in bottom line savings and revenue from being more responsive to events, CEP should not be ignored. This is a major emerging marketplace that offers automated business optimization and actions in a much more timely manner. There is no way business will be able to change applications at the pace required to keep up with demand to monitor business events over the next few years, There has to be a better way of doing this. That way is CEP - a declarative approach that involves no programming. CEP is the next generation beyond BAM. This announcement may well see IBM's competitors move in on this market to compete considering the growth potential. While the backlog of IT systems requiring SOA integration is growing, companies should educate themselves in this field as they may well benefit from looking at CEP as a way to become more responsive to business events rather than building everything themselves. There is no doubt that the era of "Right Time" BI has begun.