Five Questions to Ask Before Choosing a Cloud Platform Solution
It seems that most SMBs have or are considering adopting some sort of cloud computing technologies. Recent surveys, like this State of SMB IT Report from Spiceworks (registration required), have shown that 61 percent of SMBs are using cloud-based technologies in some form within their organizations. But how will this trend play out in coming years?
A recent report from TechNavio forecasts SMB IT spending market for the next four years. The report indicates that global SMB spending in the IT arena has increased in the sector of cloud technologies. Though deploying cloud infrastructure, it says, is becoming increasingly expensive and could pose a threat to its future growth and adoption by SMBs.
Another report by IDC, though, says that SMB cloud spending will grow by nearly 20 percent over the next five years. It goes on to say that three in 10 midsized organizations will adopt public cloud solutions. The IDC report cites Web hosting and hosted email as early examples of cloud computing that were fully embraced by many SMBs years prior to the popularization of the term “cloud computing.” It sees SMB comfort levels with using these types of services as strong and predicts that cloud engagements will be “more central to core IT operations, at least in early adopter firms.”
Forbes agrees with the IDC prediction. In its roundup of SMB cloud computing predictions, it shows that most agree that cloud adoption will continue to increase. It cites additional predictions from Forrester that say that “channel partners will increase their reliance on cloud software and services from 22% to 27% from 2013 to 2014,” which in large part will be from SMBs.
This post also provides data from Parallels, a hosting and cloud provider, which predicts SMB cloud growth of 32 percent CAGR by the year 2015. This report also forecasts global SMB SaaS applications to grow from $14.5 billion in 2012 to $33.8 billion by 2015.
Although not all analysts were in agreement on the continued growth of cloud technologies within the SMB market, it seems that they do at least agree that it has become popular with this group. As the technology matures and new and better services are offered, it seems likely that cloud computing will continue to be a big buzz within IT organizations big and small.
