10. THE NEED TO DO WHAT EVERYONE ELSE IS DOING. In 2011, studies showed 72% of companies were using “The Cloud” in some form. The projections for 2013 suggest an increase to 93% of companies using it, and by 2015 there are strong indications that business use of “The Cloud” will reach 98%, with 52% of companies using it extensively.
09. THE NEED TO DEPLOY NEW FEATURES AND APPLICATIONS FASTER. 38% of the companies using “The Cloud” today said it is because it allowed them to deploy new applications faster. No matter what the company does, their systems must constantly be upgraded and improved. Add to that the public interest with over 500,000 apps on the Android Market and well over 600,000 apps in the App Store, and there is a bit of a race to keep up!
08. THE NEED TO STAY “CURRENT” ON THE SOFTWARE RUNNING THE COMPANY. Making sure all the software that runs the business is on the latest version is a daunting task. Many of “The Cloud” providers today offer services to insure that some or all of the applications hosted with them are indeed kept at current versions. This in turn allows the IT staff to focus on more urgent tasks, like the one above, getting 37 new games into the App Store.
07. THE NEED TO HAVE BETTER SECURITY IN PLACE. 45% of companies using “The Cloud” said they moved in this direction because of a need for increased security of the data upon which their organization depends. This was especially true in smaller companies where the budgets were not available to have a highly trained network security engineer (like Munjibar) on staff, and thus the typical security protocol was “security by ignorance.” If you don’t know where the data is, then it must be secure.
06. THE NEED TO LOWER IT COSTS. With IT spending hitting $3.67 trillion in 2011 there are more than a few concerns about the cost of IT expenditures. Over 55% of companies found they were able to lower their IT costs, and thus drop real dollars to the bottom line, by moving to “The Cloud.” Just the decrease in headcount and payroll-related expenses are substantial. Munjibar works for $5 per hour and has plenty of time to figure out the problem while he has you on hold for the 2 hours.
05. THE NEED FOR A COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE. Every business knows that one of the most important factors in its dream of success is to be different and have a competitive advantage over the others in its field. 57% of companies using “The Cloud” indicated they felt this gave them the ability to refine their software to show their users they were on the leading edge of technology.
04. THE NEED FOR MORE EFFICIENT COLLABORATION BETWEEN CUSTOMERS AND VENDORS. Terms like Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) and Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) have been around the computer industry for a very long time. However, the need to integrate systems and allow applications to “talk” to each other is extremely important. 61% of companies said their move to “The Cloud” was driven by their need to make this integration happen more efficiently.
03. THE NEED FOR REGULATORY COMPLIANCE. Whether it is complying with Sarbanes-Oxley, SAS 70/SSAE 16, the FDA, OSHA, or any other regulatory board, companies are finding that hosting
their applications in “The Cloud” is allowing them to work under the umbrella of the Host and thus defer some of those costs and regulations to the Host themselves.
02. THE NEED FOR REDUCED CAPITAL EXPENDITURES. Even with the advances in technology, good computer equipment is expensive. It has been well established that by choosing “The Cloud” any size company can achieve the same benefits as a Fortune 1000 company, save up to 50% of the overhead and reinvest the savings in growth and new jobs, all without capital investments.
01. THE NEED FOR DISASTER RECOVERY. Let’s face it, the data center of most companies is a closet somewhere with inadequate ventilation and maybe a lock on the door, or not. Thus, whether it is the threat of a hurricane, or an employee going “postal,” many companies indicated the need for a Disaster Recovery Plan was a major factor in their decision to go to “The Cloud.” A word of caution should be inserted here: most hosting facilities charge a substantially higher fee if you need redundant or backup servers. But, if Munjibar happens to bump the power button there is a good chance your software in “The Cloud” will go down too. With all this in mind “The Cloud” is definitely something to consider in business today, but check back next issue for Dave’s Top Ten Pitfalls of “The Cloud.”
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