Global cloud migration continues to drive a market that is expected to hit the $1 trillion mark by 2028. Facts and Elementscloud will grow from $429.6 billion in 2021 to $1.0257 trillion by 2028. However, a recent report by Forrester Consulting, commissioned by Standardsshows that 63% of IT and decision makers surveyed say their organization lacks support for a wide variety of cloud resources.
While cloud delivers scalability, growth, availability, cost reduction, and faster execution times, it also presents challenges that are often underappreciated or poorly understood.
Companies continue to flock to the cloud to host their businesses online for a number of reasons. As the era of data augmentation subsides, omnichannel strategies evolve, and new applications are developed to deliver enhanced customer experiences, organizations prefer cloud infrastructure due to capital expenditure ( CAPEX) and operating expenses (OPEX).
Disrupting technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML) and application development tools is another reason why companies move to the cloud. Unfortunately, computing resources and cloud security are often taken for granted.
Cloud success leads to growth but also challenges
Not everything is bad news for those taking advantage of the power of the cloud. Quali’s Forrester Consulting report, titled; “Scale and innovate with Infrastructure Automation,” revealing that 57% of leaders surveyed said their organization has met or exceeded their results expectations. This growth has spurred companies to continue investing in cloud technology. But in this expansion plan, it is difficult for organizations to meet their top priorities.
“Current infrastructure capabilities prohibit organizations from moving as quickly as decision makers would like because they do not have the right resources, support, or insights available,” the report said.
Organizations operating in many sounds or hybrid cloud environment is most affected. Governance barriers are slowing companies down and preventing them from scaling quickly.
Furthermore, organizations are experiencing the consequences of these cloud challenges. More than half (58%) of those surveyed said their company is at greater risk, 52% say they incur costs and “unnecessary costs” and 51% say problems limit their capacity to innovate.
The cloud is seen as the ultimate infrastructure solution for storing data and systems and managing it through dashboards and visualizations, but 60% of IT leaders complain about reporting , synthesis and analysis are not enough. More than half of those surveyed said they needed more support for delivery methods and complained about the lack of support for hybrid models.
UNDERSTAND: Recruitment Toolkit: Cloud Engineer (TechRepublic Premium)
Challenges of cloud security
Data loss, compliance, cyberattacks, and cloud ransomware are becoming increasingly common. IBM’s “Cost of data breach in 2021“The report studied 537 violations in 17 countries and discovered a number of related violations cloud security cost.
According to IBM, the average cost of a data breach for businesses that have undergone a “critical digital transformation” during the pandemic is $4.26 million. Organizations in the final stages of cloud modernization take an average of 252 days to identify and contain a data breach.
The IBM Security Report calculates that a public cloud breach costs an average of $4.8 million. When it comes to the private cloud breach, IBM puts the cost at $4.55 million and for the hybrid cloud breach, the cost is $3.61 million. And cloud breaches continue to increase at an alarming rate.
Adservio explains that cloud misconfiguration is one of the leading causes of attacks. The added cloud environment to augment the endpoint also creates a broader “digital surface”. Cybercriminals will use phishing attacks, account hacks, malware, and DDoS to find the weakest point of entry.
In addition, organizations that depend on their cloud environment to operate can be hampered in business if their cloud systems are compromised. Ransomware attacks often causes organizations to shut down.
The complexity of the cloud and new technology can also create human error and security misconfiguration. Finally, compliance, loss of visibility, data, and workloads in the cloud environment is also a challenge.
UNDERSTAND: iCloud vs. OneDrive: Which is Best for Mac, iPad, and iPhone Users? (Free PDF) (TechRepublic)
What do organizations look for in the cloud?
According to Forrester Consulting, the top priorities of cloud leaders are customers, performance, and speed. The cloud is the perfect place to shape, create, and deliver omnichannel marketing brand experiences to new or existing customers. This trend is transforming all industries, from retail to automotive.
Forrester’s report for Quali reveals that organizations are looking at the cloud to execute these customer experience strategies. They specifically want to increase the cloud applications that serve their customers and generate more revenue.
Organizations have also learned lessons from the global disruptions during the pandemic, the wars between Russia and Ukraine, the transportation and logistics crisis, the gas inflation crisis, and international tensions in the region. . Supply chain disruption has impacted almost every sector, from essential products to superconductors and chips.
The cloud has provided companies with modern solutions and has the ability to better manage supply chains, suppliers, and distribution. Cloud analytics can check demand and inventory, as well as cloud tools like AI or digital twins can predict disruptions and identify opportunities to optimize supply chains in the face of disruptions.
Business leaders surveyed by Forrester Consulting for Quali agree that “improving their resilience to deliver their products and services consistently without interruption” is a top priority.
Scaling and governance are also top priorities for the cloud. In terms of business value, 58% of those surveyed say they want faster infrastructure and 59% want faster automation than hybrid cloud infrastructure.
Business leaders look forward to continuing to grow their businesses and infrastructure in the cloud. They believe that the cloud, with all its benefits and automation, will improve efficiency and productivity, and provide better time-to-market delivery. However, the initial excitement about disruptive cloud technologies has subsided.
Organizations and companies are beginning to wake up to a new cloud reality. They are now focusing their efforts not only on moving, operating, and scaling in the cloud, but also on tracking results, detecting resource shortages and vulnerabilities, and consolidating their operations.
