Cost no longer primary driver for cloud adoption: study

Just 16 per cent of UK firms consider cost to be the main driver for initial cloud adoption, a new survey from the Cloud Industry Forum (CIF) has found.

The majority of respondents (53 per cent) said that the flexibility that cloud services enable in a business is now more likely to encourage them to start using cloud computing. This was particularly true for businesses with fewer than 20 employees.

However, cost became a more significant driver for organizations (69 per cent) that were planning to expand their cloud service adoption or consider how they currently access technology through the supply chain.

Generally, the survey found that cloud adoption was becoming widely accepted in U.K. organizations. The Cloud Industry Forum questioned 450 senior IT and business decision-makers in public and private sector end-user organizations and 200 people from the channel, including IT consultancies and systems integrators, for the survey.

Nearly half (48 per cent) of all organizations questioned use a cloud service, with companies with more than 20 staff more likely to adopt cloud than smaller firms and public organizations.

Heads of IT also tend to be the people who take the decision to move to the cloud (65 per cent), compared to 25 per cent who said it was still the responsibility of CEOs or managing directors.

Meanwhile, organizations that have adopted cloud services are mostly very satisfied with them. The major cloud services being deployed are email, back-up and disaster recovery, storage and Web-hosting services.

Satisfaction was at 94 per cent, which was encouraging existing users to expand their adoption to other areas of their IT operations.

Piers Linney, joint CEO for Outsourcery, a founder member of CIF, said: “With only two per cent of respondents saying they would never consider cloud, it is clear that we are heralding a new era in business computing that will be disruptive for many of the existing providers of IT and comms solutions.”

Would you recommend this article?

Share

Thanks for taking the time to let us know what you think of this article!
We'd love to hear your opinion about this or any other story you read in our publication.


Jim Love, Chief Content Officer, IT World Canada

Featured Download

Featured Articles

Cybersecurity in 2024: Priorities and challenges for Canadian organizations 

By Derek Manky As predictions for 2024 point to the continued expansion...

Survey shows generative AI is a top priority for Canadian corporate leaders.

Leaders are devoting significant budget to generative AI for 2024 Canadian corporate...

Related Tech News

Tech Jobs

Our experienced team of journalists and bloggers bring you engaging in-depth interviews, videos and content targeted to IT professionals and line-of-business executives.

Tech Companies Hiring Right Now