Carol Ko| Asiacloudforum
According to “The Asian State of the Cloud 2012” survey conducted by Asia Cloud Forum in August and November last year, enterprise hybrid cloud (38.3%) and private cloud (35%) shared similar rates of adoption in Asia. Public cloud adoption (16.7%) trailed far behind. And a sizeable 10% of the respondents said cloud computing was simply “not suitable for use at their organizations.”
The primary reason behind their possible engagement in cloud computing, according to the survey results, was to enhance flexibility and scalability of IT resources (63.3%). The next major reasons were to control IT costs (46.7%), to optimize local/ global IT infrastructure through virtualization (43.3%), to modernize business process (41.7%) and to reduce capital expenditure (41.7%). Interestingly, just 16.7% of the respondents said cloud computing was part of their corporate strategy.
Following separate interviews with some of the key cloud service providers and enablers in the region, Asia Cloud Forum presents these 10 biggest predictions about cloud computing adoption in 2013:
1. Hong Kong blue chips will take up cloud
According to Mark Smith, managing director, Savvis Asia, “There has been a lot of request for proposals from blue chip companies about cloud services lately in Hong Kong.”
2. Companies will start to host mission critical apps on cloud
There has been strong cloud uptake across selected workloads like e-commerce and development/test environments. “This year I saw many IT decision makers consider cloud for their core business applications. In 2013 I anticipate this trend will continue to grow significantly and to also extend to mission critical apps,” said Smith at Savvis Asia.
“A focus will be upon ‘hybrid clouds’ using dedicated single-tenanted clouds for core production services, combined with a public cloud infrastructure that can provide additional agility and scale.”3. Security-minded enterprises will consider business class cloud
The top barriers to cloud adoption for enterprises at the moment remain data security and privacy concerns. “However the business class cloud, which enables enterprises to bypass the uncertain public internet infrastructure to connect directly into public clouds, is offering a safer alternative that will make many rethink their cloud approach in the coming year,” said Lane Patterson, Equinix‘s CTO.
4. FSI will increase hybrid cloud adoption
Owing to their strict security and compliance standards, the FSI will retain their legacy platforms. Until an established industry specific framework is accepted and adopted by the sector’s leading players, mass movements from on-premise to public cloud platforms will not come to pass, said Jovis Mak, Server Business Group Lead, Microsoft Hong Kong.
“Nevertheless, more financial firms will start to seriously assess the possibility of switching to cloud services, in hopes it will allow them to gain a competitive advantage over their rivals. As an initial step, the industry may start to see increased adoption of hybrid cloud platforms.”
5. Non-FSI enterprises will start to host biz-critical apps on public cloud
More non-financial services industry (FSI) enterprises will start to host essential business applications on public cloud platforms. “In an effort to minimize operating costs [like land rent and software licenses,] enterprises will start to reduce their physical workstation count by relying on virtualization. Those that have already done so will likely strive to further reduce costs by shifting from private to public cloud platforms,” said Microsoft Hong Kong’s Mak.
6. Healthcare industry will lead public cloud adoption
Vertical industries such as healthcare will lead public cloud adoption, realizing its impact on security, the value of specialized community cloud services and the ability to address compliance while driving down costs, said John Michelsen, CA Technologies‘ CTO.
7. Private cloud will become location of choice for data storage
With the benefits of cloud computing becoming more apparent, and the ease of cloud management [becoming] more of a reality, enterprises are now starting to realize that they can take the same know-how from building the public cloud and apply it to the private cloud. “Moving into 2013, the private cloud will continue to change the way we build, deliver and consume applications. They will replace PCs as the choice location to store data and access services,” said Yaj Malik, area vice president, ASEAN, Citrix.
8. More companies will fall prey to single-incident continuity risks
More companies will be subjected to increase single-incident continuity risks as IT systems start to become further intertwined due to server consolidation and advanced business requirements. Accordingly, companies will require additional protocols for remedial actions and incident prevention, said Microsoft Hong Kong’s Mak.
9. Server shipments will hugely decline with increased enterprise cloud uptake
In 2013, more enterprise users will start to experience consolidation and reap benefits from private cloud adoption. Because of this, server shipments, excluding those from cloud and IT service providers, will likely decline precipitously, Mak predicted.
10. Consumer cloud service will see double-digit growth
The consumer cloud service market will experience rapid double-digit growth, as more user start using the cloud for gaming, entertainment and personal storage via their mobile devices, Mak added.
