All signs point to cloud services being one of the big winners in 2014, and not just among dotcom startups that are using the cloud to quickly launch new business offerings. While Internet businesses certainly have benefited from the cloud, in many ways 2014 will be the year that every business starts sharing in the rewards.
“2014 could represent a more disruptive phase for the cloud, which is not just for the Googles, Facebooks and Amazons anymore,” noted a Barclays report on the global IT outlook for 2014.
That’s because the cloud enables more with less, both bringing added flexibility and better functionality at reduced costs over on-premise equipment.
Cloud computing is one of the top five areas that CIOs cite for IT spending increases in 2014, according to a recent ComputerWorld survey. Others include security technologies, virtualization, wireless/mobility, and business analytics.
Reading between the lines, almost all of those spending increases relate to the cloud and the fundamental shift in computing from the office to the cloud, part of the larger mobility trend that has seen computing become far more virtual and flexible.
A recent Gartner (News - Alert) CIO survey also bears this out. Of the top 10 strategic technology trends for 2014, Gartner listed three that were cloud-related and two more that were related to mobility directly and the cloud indirectly.
Of the $3.8 trillion that is expected to be spent on IT worldwide in 2014, Gartner predicted that 40 percent will come from telecom services.
“It’s no surprise that enterprises looking to optimize their telecom and networking investments are shifting from the offerings of traditional global carriers to cloud-based networking,” noted cloud optimization provider, Virtela (News - Alert), in a recent blog post. “Asset-light networking that exploits the value of cloud and virtualization can significantly reduce upfront capital and ongoing operating expenses.”
The first wave of benefits from the cloud largely accrued to businesses in the technology industry, especially startups that knew how to exploit the flexibility of cloud computing resources. But with cloud services now expanding to cover just about every possible business need, even less tech-savvy firms are starting to exploit the cloud.
While there is not just one trend in the IT industry, it is safe to say that if there was an overall IT megatrend in 2014, it would be the cloud.
Edited by Rory J. Thompson