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Corporate “no-cloud” policies will be as rare as “no-Internet” policies by 2020: Gartner


June 22, 2016   by Canadian Underwriter


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By 2020, a corporate “no-cloud” policy will be as rare as a “no-Internet” policy is today, according to a new report from information technology research and advisory company Gartner, Inc.

Cloud computing digital conceptCloud-first, and even cloud-only, is replacing the defensive no-cloud stance that dominated many large providers in recent years, Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner said in a statement on Wednesday. However, Gartner stressed that this does not mean that everything will be cloud-based and “concern will remain valid in some cases. But the extreme of having nothing cloud-based will largely disappear.”

Hybrid will be the most common usage of the cloud, but this will require public cloud to be part of the overall strategy, Gartner noted in the report, titled Market Insight: Cloud Computing’s Drive to Digital Business Creates Opportunities for Providers. Technology providers will increasingly be able to assume that their customers will be able to consume cloud capabilities, Gartner said.

“Aside from the fact that many organizations with a no-cloud policy actually have some under-the-radar or unavoidable cloud usage, we believe that this position will become increasingly untenable,” said Jeffrey Mann, research vice president at Gartner, in the statement. “Cloud will increasingly be the default option for software deployment. The same is true for custom software, which increasingly is designed for some variation of public or private cloud.”

Gartner made a number of other predictions, including that by 2019, more than 30% of the 100 largest vendors’ new software investments will have shifted from “cloud-first” to “cloud-only.” The now well-established stance of cloud-first in software design and planning is gradually being augmented or replaced by cloud-only, Gartner added, referring to private and hybrid cloud scenarios.

“More leading-edge IT capabilities will be available only in the cloud, forcing reluctant organizations closer to cloud adoption,” suggested Yefim V. Natis, vice president and Gartner Fellow. “While some applications and data will remain locked in older technologies, more new solutions will be cloud-based, thus further increasing demand for integration infrastructure.

As delivery shifts more to the cloud, Natis continued, most IT organizations will have to reorganize to reflect the business realities of cloud computing: continuous innovation and change, pervasive integration, competing with cloud providers for some initiatives and crucial prevalence of influence over control in IT’s relationship with lines of business. “While historically the greatest competitor to external service providers has been internal IT, with spend shifts, structural reorganizations and the business realities mentioned above, cloud providers will be in the position to gain the upper hand,” Natis said.


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3 Comments » for Corporate “no-cloud” policies will be as rare as “no-Internet” policies by 2020: Gartner
  1. Peter says:

    The reason for this has more to do with staying competitive, than for any other reason. To say that companies are now relying on a “cloud” based solution for reasons of security can seem confusing to some, especially since the subject of security was and still continues to be a “mental” roadblock in adopting cloud solutions with “open arms”.
    The “cloud” is inevitable, whether it’s private, public (Google, Amazon, Digital Ocean) or a hybrid. The real reason is speed and cost savings.

    Think of Cloud like cookies on your computer. It’s almost like a form of virtual memory that helps the end user fulfill online transactions quicker, faster and more efficiently. Speed is a major ranking factor in Google’s search algorithm!

    Resource usage is another big reason why Companies are adopting ‘cloud” strategies. By not using “cloud’, Web hosting servers have to continuously deliver the same content to that same End user, regardless of how many times that info or specific page is requested by that same User. It’s almost like deleting browser history on your computer. Every time you delete your browser history or temporary files, it takes a bit longer for that same page to generate, the next time that page or website is sought. Without the use of caching, a Web server has to work harder, use more resources, costing businesses more. This applies not only to businesses but to everyone.

  2. Ted says:

    How do cloud strategies fit into disaster preparedness? Once the internet is down, due to a major earthquake, solar storm, etc.; you lose access to the Cloud. If your customer data is stored on an in-house server you can still gain access to the information when it is most needed.

  3. Peter says:

    Great question!
    Cloud solutions or strategies can help mitigate risk and can also be implemented in a Risk Management program for any Organization.
    When I speak of Risk Management I do so in a contemporary sense, in that, the approach to RM is proactive and holistic, compared to the “old” model which was merely, reactive. Regardless of which “camp” your Company adheres to (old way or new way to RM), “cloud” storage or any utilization of it, can definitely be a positive thing in general, and not only in a Business Continuity context.
    How is cloud computing a “good thing”?
    • Redundancy – If failover (downtime) happens, there is always a backup. You can’t run a Business these days when your systems are down. Figure out how much you would stand to lose due to a service interruption. Compare that with other potential losses or liabilities.

    • Speed – as I mentioned in my previous comment post. The speed in which your company’s info is served to the End user is critical, especially in a B2C application. You don’t want to lose a Customer, potential Customer, stakeholder etc. (or any cost in opportunity, really) due to a “slower” digital infrastructure.

    Here’s a good article which explains the differences between SaaS, PaaS and IaaS.
    https://support.rackspace.com/white-paper/understanding-the-cloud-computing-stack-saas-paas-iaas/

    There is also this DrasS: Disaster Recovery as a Service (careful with this one because it can fall within the functions of any of the above mentioned: Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS).
    http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/disaster-recovery-as-a-service-DRaaS

    Today, many businesses and organizations use “cloud” without even being aware it. It’s very important to know what type of Web Hosting you choose and where they fit in the Web hosting Pyramid. Is it a Saas, PaaS or IaaS? Examine the root first, which usually is the IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service) that predicates any other service that stems from it. ie. PaaS and Saas
    I speak from experience. I remember choosing a “Canadian” web hosting provider (I’m still having a hard time defining that btw – ;), thinking that by choosing this route my Customers information would be safely confined to a Canadian jurisdiction. Was I ever wrong! I used a free service on the internet to track Hops, and saw that my IP was bouncing all the way to Europe. I stopped using them after that. But it was not their fault, as they were left to the devices of the IaaS they rented their Web Servers from.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hop_(networking)
    Although, I stopped using them, I’ve come to the realization that the “cloud” is inevitable and that to stay competitive, caching and CDN’s are a “must” in my opinion. The issue of privacy has shifted for me from a position of how, I MYSELF, can reduce, mitigate and prevent privacy exposure, to allowing a third party in assuming that position. However, although I have transferred the risk to someone else, it places greater responsibility on me to ensure they are properly managed and operating to standards.

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