INTELLIGENT BRANDS // Cloud
93.7 % of global businesses see cloud as critical to meeting immediate business needs
NTT , the global technology services
company , has released its 2021 Hybrid Cloud Report , which highlights the critical need for business agility and the role hybrid cloud has had on helping businesses achieve this .
Before COVID-19 , many companies had embarked on Digital Transformation journeys , but the pandemic highlighted that many were not as agile as they had previously thought . The pandemic laid bare deficiencies in businesses ’ cloud infrastructure , security and network architecture capabilities , hindering their ability to adapt and remain agile .
The pandemic has forced a cultural mindset shift with global organisations adapting their agility plans from recovering infrastructure and applications to getting office-based workers set up and working from home . Despite this uncertainty , the pandemic has provided a significant opportunity to accelerate Digital Transformation initiatives .
The report , which conducted research with 950 decision-makers in 13 countries across five regions , highlighted the increasing reliance on technology and found that :
• A business lifeline : 89.5 % agree that the pandemic has forced their business to rely on technology more than ever before
• The benefits of hybrid cloud are already clear : 60.9 % of organisations globally are already using , or piloting hybrid cloud
• Hybrid cloud is the future : 32.7 % of respondents plan to implement a hybrid solution within 12 – 24 months
It ’ s clear that hybrid cloud is now seen as critical to data-driven processes and realtime decisions both now and in the future .
Hybrid cloud , when implemented correctly , drives efficiencies
Businesses are continuing to tighten their purse strings and look to hybrid cloud to increase cost efficiency and drive the organisation ’ s overall performance . The report found that a more efficient total cost of IT operations is the biggest driver ( 41.3 %) of hybrid cloud adoption , especially given the shift to a distributed workforce model where businesses now need to access data and applications in new , different and often complex ways .
In addition , the use of hybrid cloud is helping nearly a third of businesses ( 32.8 %) improve the speed of deployment of applications and services in order to create operational efficiencies . Businesses , however , need to implement hybrid cloud in a way that will optimise environments to maximise efficiencies . This is why over half of organisations ( 52.7 %) strongly agree on the need to engage with experts , such as managed cloud providers .
Partnering for success
Industry collaboration and working with external experts will provide businesses with the right knowledge and skills to set up their hybrid cloud environments for agility . When we asked our respondents about the types of partner used , 72.1 % of businesses said they engaged with systems integrators , while 58.2 % engaged with specialist information security consultants or MSSPs , highlighting the importance of security to cloud deployments . p
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