According to a NaviSite survey most UK businesses recognise the benefits of cloud computing, but many are still running a significant amount of systems either in-house, or externally on traditional platforms.
Three-quarters of those surveyed had migrated less than 50% of their infrastructure to the cloud. A major cause of this was found to be the lack of the correct tools and skills needed to execute migration.
A finding which will come as no surprise is the 59% of respondents who cited security as their main concern when choosing a cloud service provider.
Nearly half said customisation was extremely important, while 31% said the service provider’s ability to unlock tangible cost saving on existing spend was their top consideration.
A huge concern highlighted by the survey was that of mobility. 94% of UK respondents noted that enabling mobility is a concern, which has driven many companies to seek out and deploy cloud-based solutions such as VDI, Daas, or EMM.
Despite this concern, 68% of UK businesses surveyed still do not have a BYOD policy, and nearly half said that IT team resources and skills posed the biggest challenge.
"In the last several years we have seen more businesses realize the benefits of cloud infrastructure adoption and also building hybrid strategies to accommodate their traditional systems. While organisations have made a positive step towards implementing cloud-based services, the survey highlights that there are still some challenges these users face," said Sean McAvan, managing director, NaviSite Europe Ltd.
"Effective business leaders recognise that while they need to leverage virtual technologies to remain competitive, they also need to leverage their existing investments in traditional platforms."
"Those companies who most effectively leverage cloud and virtual technology often partner with a managed service provider, freeing them up to focus on their core competencies."
NaviSite surveyed more than 250 IT professionals from organisations with more than 300 employees across the UK and US.
