Cloud interoperability and app mobility outrank cost and security for primary hybrid cloud benefits
Enterprises plan to increase hybrid cloud usage, with 91% stating hybrid cloud as the ideal IT model, but only 18% stating they have that model today, according to Nutanix. Application mobility across any cloud is a top priority for 97% of respondents – with 88% of respondents saying it would “solve a lot of my problems.”
IT decision makers ranked matching applications to the right cloud environment as a critical capability, and 35% of organizations using public clouds overspent their annual budget. When asked to rank the primary benefits of hybrid cloud, interoperability between cloud types (23%) and the ability to move applications back and forth between clouds (16%) outranked cost (6%) and security (5%) as the primary benefits.
In roles centered on agility and digital transformation, IT teams understand that runtime environments for enterprise apps change constantly. Respondents indicated a need for greater orchestration and application mobility across cloud environments, as they seek flexibility to move apps to the “right” cloud on a more dynamic basis.
Shadow IT practices that circumvent enterprise IT teams are posing a significant challenge to forecasting and controlling public cloud spend with well over half of respondents (57%) reporting one or more incidents of shadow IT.
Other key findings:
Hybrid cloud better addresses business needs over single public cloud, including the price tag: 87% of respondents said that hybrid cloud as an IT trend is having a positive impact on their businesses, and more hybrid cloud users reported all their needs were being met (49%) compared to single public cloud users (37%).
Organizations that use public cloud spend 26% of their annual IT budget on public cloud. Perhaps most striking is the fact that only 6% using public cloud came in under budget, while nearly six times as many (35%) overspent in their use of public cloud resources.
Security is top of mind for determining workloads: 71% of respondents surveyed for the report ranked data security and regulatory compliance as the top factor in determining where to provision their workloads. This was followed by performance at 62%, ease of management at 53%, and cost at 52%.
App developers today are circumventing IT: 57% of respondents said their developers are circumventing IT when it comes to deciding where applications run, putting the organization at potential risk.
Finding hybrid IT talent is difficult: With clear benefits to a hybrid model, respondents say scarcity of hybrid experts is a challenge, with 54% claiming talent retention is part of the problem.
EMEA is expected to surpass the Americas with hybrid cloud adoption: Regionally, the Americas reported greater use of hybrid clouds now (22%) and within 12 months’ time (31%). However, the two-year outlook has EMEA (43%) surpassing the Americas’ hybrid plans (39%) and APJ (39%) catching up.