By Dick Csaplar, Senior Research Analyst for the Aberdeen Group
Cloud computing is and will have an extensive impact on the IT infrastructure of companies of all sizes.
I’ve come to this conclusion thanks to my extensive research as a Senior Analyst with the Aberdeen Group. And after a survey of a wide range of companies in January, we’re able to see an even clearer picture of how the public cloud is being used.
The data show that small companies — organizations with up to 100 employees — are, in general, gaining much from using new services based in the cloud, specifically ones they could not afford to purchase and manage on their own. As seen in the chart below, small companies do not find application integration and customization a challenge. Because these tasks are very technical, small businesses don’t even attempt them: They use the cloud services as they are provided, “right from the box.”
Top Cloud Challenges by Enterprise Size
However, it’s a different story for their larger cousins. Midsize companies — those with 100 to 1,000 workers — face some challenges. They struggle to manage IT environments that are as complex and rigid as those of large corporations with more than 1,000 employees. As I show in the chart above, midsize companies particularly struggle with large-enterprise practices such as application customization, integration, and security.
The survey results suggest two strategies for midsize businesses to deal with the challenge of introducing new cloud applications into existing infrastructures with few IT heads.
The two key strategies: 1) outsource and 2) rent an expert. Sound familiar?
Read original article at Forbes.com here.
