Two-thirds of respondents to a survey on cloud computing requirements conducted on behalf of connectivity provider Colt Technology Services indicated that their cloud migration projects have been effected by the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. However, the same survey also showed that 96% of the senior IT decision-makers polled are comfortable with the idea of moving critical business applications or services to the cloud and that 44% have already moved 50% to 75% of such functions to the cloud and 8% had extended that figure between 75% and 100%.
The Insights for Professionals Network conducted the survey for Colt in February 2020, then repolled the respondents for their views on the impact of COVID-19. The survey reflects responses from 255 European participants who work for enterprises with 500 or more employees. The respondents hold senior roles and responsibility for making high-level IT or networking decisions, according to Colt.
The respondents say that they are moving several functions and systems to the cloud, including:
- Data management (84%)
- Customer relationship management (63%)
- Enterprise resource planning (57%)
- Employee communications (46%)
- Contact center (43%).
Perhaps not surprisingly, 86% said they are managing multiple cloud environments. Despite such challenges as security (cited by 59% of respondents), reliable connectivity (48%), and system downtime concerns (43%), 86% said they planned another cloud migration within 12 months of taking the initial survey. That, of course, was before the pandemic struck. Nevertheless, Colt expressed confidence that delayed projects would be restarted this year.
“Colt has known that a momentous shift towards the cloud has been coming, and it’s clear from our research that the cloud is delivering on or exceeding expectations for businesses. This means confidence is high as people look toward their next migration projects – with most starting in less than nine months,” said Colt Chief Commercial Officer Keri Gilder, citing the pre-pandemic responses. “I was not surprised to learn that connectivity and security are still concerns for many enterprises undertaking their cloud migration journeys. When migrating operations to the cloud, it’s critical to work with a partner that has a network infrastructure that connects to the key cloud environments globally.”
Colt provides connectivity across Europe, Asia, and North America via its Colt IQ Network. Its infrastructure connects more than 900 data centers more than 29,000 buildings on-net. The full research report is available here.
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