As the world grows increasingly digital, the options available to companies seeking to harness the power of the cloud are growing exponentially.
At a recent CanadianCIO Innovation summit, one cloud specialist estimated that by December 2017 there would be 10,000 cloud tools and associated options available to interested companies. A prominent research affirms the explosion in cloud options in a study that estimates the hybrid cloud market will grow to $91.74 billion USD in 2021, up from $33.28 billion USD in 2016. That’s a compound annual growth rate of 22.5 per cent for the forecast period.
A recent Gartner Inc. report indicates that by 2020, it will be as rare for a company to hold to a “no-cloud” policy as it is for a company to have a “no-Internet” policy today. Or as Kevin Casey of The Enterprisers Project stated in a recent blog article: “You’re about as likely to see Bigfoot or the Loch Ness monster in your office as you are to encounter a no-cloud rule.”
Hybrid rising
Companies adopt cloud for a number of reasons, but cost savings and efficiency are among the key drivers. Banking is one industry where a correlation between the adoption of hybrid cloud and overall performance is beginning to show. A recent report from the IBM Institute for Business Value on hybrid cloud in the banking sector indicates that top-performing banks are 88 per cent more likely than their under-performing peers to implement hybrid cloud.
“Banks in our survey that outperformed their peers in both revenue growth and operating efficiency,” says the report, “are significantly more likely to embrace adoption of hybrid cloud.”
The rise of hybrid cloud can perhaps be attributed to the fact of what it is: an almost limitless range of choices. Cloud gives companies the ability to mix and match by combining private and public platforms, and to “change the ratios” whenever they deem it necessary.
Sea of options
Today’s business world is one of perpetual change. Companies today must be flexible, and must consider new approaches to maintain their position and competitive edge. In this multi-cloud world, the question on the minds of IT leaders worldwide is: “What is the optimum cloud implementation strategy for me?”
Although companies are now spoiled for choice, too much choice is not necessarily a good thing. In a sea of options, people can easily feel overwhelmed.
December 7th webinar
On Thursday, December 7, 2017, join IT World Canada CIO Jim Love and Jason Krilich, Director Worldwide Sales Enablement, Omurco, as they explore the diversity of cloud architecture options, and how to determine which one is right for your company.
In “How to Choose the Cloud That Suits Your Needs,” Love and Krilich will cover a wide range of topics, including:
- Data residency and regulation: Can you choose where your data is resident?
- Public or private: Can you have both components working together?
- How to get a single unified view of your architecture
- How to exploit software-defined architectures
Find out more or register for “How to Choose the Cloud That Suits Your Needs.”