NaviSite, Inc a Time Warner Cable company, today announced the results of a recent survey that found cloud adoption within the enterprise has grown steadily, but that security and compliance remain key considerations when evaluating in-house and service provider options. Among cloud services, infrastructure-as-a-service remains the principal driver, though Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) and Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) offerings are being considered to address the needs of an increasingly global and mobile workforce. The survey, conducted by Redshift Research and sponsored by NaviSite, was aimed at IT decision makers across the U.S. and U.K. to help understand their use of cloud computing, vendor selection process and principal concerns over migrating to a cloud based infrastructure.
Enterprise Organizations Continue to Shift Workloads to the Cloud
The survey revealed one-third of US respondents have already migrated a significant amount (50-70 percent) of their IT infrastructure to the cloud, driven by their desire to improve reliability, uptime, and offer improved service levels. Growing confidence and sustained demand continues to drive adoption of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) with a keen interest in private cloud and hybrid cloud services going into 2015. According to the survey, 65 percent of U.S. respondents identified IaaS private cloud as one of their top priorities in the coming year, and consider a service provider’s ability to personalize solution as a key criterion for vendor selection.
Security Remains a Top Concern
Although enterprise IT is becoming increasingly comfortable with the cloud, security remains a top concern. Nearly 100 percent of U.S. respondents reflected some level of concern in securing enterprise data as part of their list of IT priorities, with nearly half (48%) citing it amongst their top three concerns. Also, security continues to be a key priority when enterprise organizations look at migrating IT workloads to either an IaaS model (61 percent) or when considering colocation services (58 percent). While there is still a fair amount of security anxiety surrounding cloud computing, maturation of the available service provider offerings combined with evolving best practices are resulting in widespread adoption. Notably, cloud providers with extensive experience in providing compliant services across cloud, traditional managed hosting, and colocation bring a comprehensive mindset towards security and are well positioned to address these concerns.
Mobility and BYOD Creating New IT Opportunities
Throughout the enterprise, mobility and the consumerization of IT have driven many companies to seek out hosted end user computing solutions such as Desktop-as a-Service (DaaS) to help manage their growing mobile workforce. Twenty-five percent of US respondents said one of the primary considerations when evaluating DaaS solutions is the ability to secure corporate data while extending a ‘Bring Your Own Device’ (BYOD) policy to employees. Fifty-six percent of respondents currently do not have a BYOD policy in place and implementing BYOD remains a priority with nearly half of respondents citing they are considering this over the next twelve months. BYOD can help unlock benefits like increased productivity, reduced IT and operational costs, and seamless mobility across a broad set of end-point devices for employees. Among the barriers in implementing BYOD, IT leaders find themselves facing several key challenges such as:
- IT team resources/skills – 60 percent
- Platform/device preferences – 54 percent
- Executive buy-in – 40 percent
“The results of this survey are in-line with the trends we are seeing in our customer base where cloud services have gathered increasing traction over the last few years. The discussion within enterprises has shifted past the initial strategy to the ground-work of driving mainstream adoption and achieving the associated benefits around agility, cost, performance, and security. Organizations are not only moving their existing mission-critical production workloads to an IaaS model but are also standing up their next-generation of applications directly on the cloud,” said Sumeet Sabharwal, General Manager, NaviSite. “While enterprises have made significant headway towards realizing a cloud-enabled IT infrastructure, the survey does highlight pressing challenges around security, compliance, and enabling workforce mobility that continue to remain top-of-mind for IT decision makers. This is where service providers like NaviSite can provide an effective partnership and bring in the necessary expertise and capabilities to help enterprises realize this IT transformation.”
