Managing disparate virtual, physical and cloud resources is a growing challenge because of added complexity for organizations protecting and recovering mission critical applications and data, a study has found. Virtual systems are not properly protected.
The study highlights that 44 percent of data on virtual systems is not regularly backed up and only one in five respondents use replication and failover technologies to protect virtual environments. Respondents also indicated that 60 percent of virtualized servers are not covered in their current disaster recovery (DR) plans. This is up significantly from the 45 percent reported by respondents in 2009.
1) Inadequate Tools, Security and Control: Using multiple tools that manage and protect applications and data in virtual environments causes major difficulties for data center managers. In particular, nearly six in 10 of these respondents (58 percent) who encountered problems protecting mission-critical applications in virtual and physical environments reported this to be a large challenge for their organization.
In terms of cloud computing, respondents reported that their organization runs approximately 50 percent of mission-critical applications in the cloud. Two-thirds of respondents (66 percent) report that security is the main concern of putting applications in the cloud. However, the biggest challenge respondents face when implementing cloud computing and storage is the ability to control failovers and make resources highly available (55 percent).
2) Resource and Storage Constraints Hamper Backup: Respondents state that 82 percent of backups occur only weekly or less frequently, rather than daily. Resource constraints, lack of storage capacity, and incomplete adoption of advanced and more efficient protection methods hamper rapid deployment of virtual environments. In particular:
-- 59 percent of respondents identified resource constraints (people, budget, and space) as the top challenge when backing up virtual machines.
-- Respondents state that the lack of available primary (57 percent) and backup storage (60 percent) hampers protecting mission critical data.
-- 50 percent of respondents use advanced methods (clientless) to reduce the impact of virtual machine backups.
3) The Downtime and Recovery Gap: The time required to recover from an outage is twice as long as respondents perceive it to be. When asked if a significant disaster were to occur at their organization that destroyed the main data center, respondents indicated that:
-- They expected the downtime per outage to be two hours to be up and running after an outage.
-- This is an improvement from 2009, when they reported it would take four hours to be up and running after an outage.
-- The median downtime per outage in the last 12 months was five hours, more than doubling the two hour expectation.
-- Organizations experienced on average four downtime incidents in the past 12 months.
4) Major Causes of Downtime: Asked what caused their organization to experience downtime over the past five years, respondents reported their outages were mainly from system upgrades, power outages and failures and cyber attacks. Specifically:
-- 72 percent experienced an outage from system upgrades, resulting in 50.9 hours of downtime.
-- 70 percent experienced an outage from power outages and failures, resulting in 11.3 hours of downtime.
-- 63 percent experienced an outage from cyber attacks over the past 12 months resulting in 52.7 hours of downtime.
There is a gap between those organizations that experience power outages and failures and those who have conducted an impact assessment for power outages and failures: Surprisingly, only 26 percent of respondents' organizations have conducted a power outage and failure impact assessment.
Comment from said Dan Lamorena, director, Storage and Availability Management Group, Symantec: While organizations are adopting new technologies such as virtualization and the cloud to reduce costs and enhance disaster recovery efforts, they are currently adding more complexity to their environments and leaving mission critical applications and data unprotected. We expect to see organizations adopt tools that provide a holistic solution with a consistent set of policies across all environments. Data center managers should simplify and standardize so they can focus on fundamental best practices that help reduce downtime.
Recommendations: Treat all environments the same: Ensure that mission-critical data and applications are treated the same across environments (virtual, cloud, physical) in terms of DR assessments and planning. Use integrated tool sets: Using fewer tools that manage physical, virtual and cloud environments will help organizations save time, training costs and help them to better automate processes. Simplify data protection processes: Embrace low-impact backup methods and deduplication to ensure that mission-critical data in virtual environments is backed up, efficiently replicated off campus. Plan and automate to minimize downtime: Prioritize planning activities and tools that automate and perform processes which minimize downtime during system upgrades. Identify issues earlier: Implement solutions that detect issues, reduce downtime and recover faster to be more in line with expectations. Don't cut corners: Organizations should implement basic technologies and processes that protect in case of an outage, and not take shortcuts that could have disastrous consequences.
About the study: The 2010 Symantec Disaster Recovery Study is an annual global study commissioned by Symantec to highlight business trends regarding disaster recovery planning and preparedness. Conducted by independent market research firm Applied Research West during October 2010, the study polled more than 1700 IT managers in large organizations across 18 countries in North America, Europe and the Middle East, Asia Pacific and South America to gain insight and understanding into some of the more complicated factors associated with
Contact: http://www.symantec.com
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
B2B Integration And Collaboration For SMEs Are Critical
Seventy-five percent of small to midsized companies say that B2B integration and collaboration are strategic initiatives in their company, a survey has found.
Connectivity between buyers and sellers is similar to social networking solutions. Collaborative networks can be instrumental in launching an average company into best-in-class status, able to compete with even larger businesses. Cloud computing SaaS solutions clearly provide a competitive advantage by reducing customer service demand and managing the complexity of today's business environment.
Comment from Aberdeen's Nari Viswanathan: Thirty-seven percent of SMEs indicate having the ability to collaborate with a network of key customers versus 56 percent of best-in-class companies. Companies should segment their customer base according to revenue and identify the top customers with whom to set up a trading community network. Key process areas should be identified such as order management collaboration, inventory management collaboration, and forecast collaboration. Once identified, these collaborative processes should be implemented.
About the report: Aberdeen benchmarked the involvement of 62 small to mid-size enterprises (SME) regarding B2B integration and collaboration initiatives with a specific emphasis on their trading partner recruitment, enablement, ongoing maintenance, and performance measurement related activities.
Contact: http://www.aberdeen.com
Connectivity between buyers and sellers is similar to social networking solutions. Collaborative networks can be instrumental in launching an average company into best-in-class status, able to compete with even larger businesses. Cloud computing SaaS solutions clearly provide a competitive advantage by reducing customer service demand and managing the complexity of today's business environment.
Comment from Aberdeen's Nari Viswanathan: Thirty-seven percent of SMEs indicate having the ability to collaborate with a network of key customers versus 56 percent of best-in-class companies. Companies should segment their customer base according to revenue and identify the top customers with whom to set up a trading community network. Key process areas should be identified such as order management collaboration, inventory management collaboration, and forecast collaboration. Once identified, these collaborative processes should be implemented.
About the report: Aberdeen benchmarked the involvement of 62 small to mid-size enterprises (SME) regarding B2B integration and collaboration initiatives with a specific emphasis on their trading partner recruitment, enablement, ongoing maintenance, and performance measurement related activities.
Contact: http://www.aberdeen.com
Information Governance Risk Factors In Public And Hybrid Clouds
A new report explores how the use of public and hybrid cloud computing services are transforming information governance risk factors and will increasingly challenge IT creativity in developing new strategies for policy compliance and enforcement.
Enterprises moving to cloud computing are looking to move to the private cloud first. Three quarters of IT organizations are running or plan to deploy applications in a private cloud environment. Private cloud helps deliver lower IT costs, improved quality of service and greater business agility. In addition, private cloud can provide better control and more secure access to corporate information. Information governance policies in place today can be leveraged in private cloud environments, where information and applications are still under direct control of IT.
As organizations move their applications to the public cloud or adopt a hybrid cloud approach in which IT services are delivered through a mix of internal cloud resources and external service providers, CIO concerns around information management and governance rise in importance. Yet, only 34 percent of the organizations have a governance policy for cloud-based information. Nearly a third admit they are not at all confident in their preparedness for managing information in the public cloud and 57 percent believe their organizations need to spend more time defining a proactive information management and governance strategy."
Comment from Mark Lewis, Chief Strategy Officer of EMC's Information Infrastructure Products Business: While the cloud presents tremendous opportunities to improve the efficiency, flexibility and cost of delivering IT services, it also compels us to manage information in new, more creative ways. If IT fails to embrace information governance strategies that span enterprise, private cloud and public cloud infrastructures, their efforts to leverage information for business advantage will never be fully realized.
Global IT leaders have identified four emerging conditions that can complicate the flow and value of information in hybrid and public clouds. These include:
-- Unchecked proliferation of incompatible cloud platforms and services
-- Fragmentation of an enterprise's information architecture through isolated data and content within the clouds
-- Escalating potential for vendor lock-in
-- Complex chains of custody for information management and security
Strategies for adapting corporate information governance policies to the cloud's unique conditions include:
-- Own the information, even if you own nothing else. Assert your organization's right to own the information, even if you don't own the infrastructure, application or service associated with that information.
-- Hope for standards, but prepare to integrate. Lay the strategic groundwork for future data integration activities today.
-- Control cloud platform proliferation. Look for shared requirements in standardized business functions, such as finance, HR and CRM, and consolidate services organization-wide on a limited number of platforms.
-- Make information "cloud ready." Encrypt information and reorganize data sets so they're accessible and usable across multiple platforms.
-- Master solution integration. Shift the IT team's mindset from owning and operating IT systems to becoming master information service integrators.
Comment from Sanjay Mirchandani, EMC's Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer: Cloud computing offers tremendous scale, mobility and agility. However, if information governance and compliance policies do not evolve in the cloud, it can create complexity in your IT environment. IT professionals need to spend time defining these policies so there are rules for capabilities, such as information mobility, to satisfy business demands. This allows you to integrate your IT policy governance and compliance efforts into your organization's broader governance, risk and compliance strategy.
About the report: The report released today is the second in a series that provides lessons learned, proven best practices and expert guidance on how to transform information into business value. EMC expects to publish additional reports from the Leadership Council for Information Advantage in the coming months.
Contact: http://www.EMC.com
Contact: http://www.CouncilForInformationAdvantage.com
Enterprises moving to cloud computing are looking to move to the private cloud first. Three quarters of IT organizations are running or plan to deploy applications in a private cloud environment. Private cloud helps deliver lower IT costs, improved quality of service and greater business agility. In addition, private cloud can provide better control and more secure access to corporate information. Information governance policies in place today can be leveraged in private cloud environments, where information and applications are still under direct control of IT.
As organizations move their applications to the public cloud or adopt a hybrid cloud approach in which IT services are delivered through a mix of internal cloud resources and external service providers, CIO concerns around information management and governance rise in importance. Yet, only 34 percent of the organizations have a governance policy for cloud-based information. Nearly a third admit they are not at all confident in their preparedness for managing information in the public cloud and 57 percent believe their organizations need to spend more time defining a proactive information management and governance strategy."
Comment from Mark Lewis, Chief Strategy Officer of EMC's Information Infrastructure Products Business: While the cloud presents tremendous opportunities to improve the efficiency, flexibility and cost of delivering IT services, it also compels us to manage information in new, more creative ways. If IT fails to embrace information governance strategies that span enterprise, private cloud and public cloud infrastructures, their efforts to leverage information for business advantage will never be fully realized.
Global IT leaders have identified four emerging conditions that can complicate the flow and value of information in hybrid and public clouds. These include:
-- Unchecked proliferation of incompatible cloud platforms and services
-- Fragmentation of an enterprise's information architecture through isolated data and content within the clouds
-- Escalating potential for vendor lock-in
-- Complex chains of custody for information management and security
Strategies for adapting corporate information governance policies to the cloud's unique conditions include:
-- Own the information, even if you own nothing else. Assert your organization's right to own the information, even if you don't own the infrastructure, application or service associated with that information.
-- Hope for standards, but prepare to integrate. Lay the strategic groundwork for future data integration activities today.
-- Control cloud platform proliferation. Look for shared requirements in standardized business functions, such as finance, HR and CRM, and consolidate services organization-wide on a limited number of platforms.
-- Make information "cloud ready." Encrypt information and reorganize data sets so they're accessible and usable across multiple platforms.
-- Master solution integration. Shift the IT team's mindset from owning and operating IT systems to becoming master information service integrators.
Comment from Sanjay Mirchandani, EMC's Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer: Cloud computing offers tremendous scale, mobility and agility. However, if information governance and compliance policies do not evolve in the cloud, it can create complexity in your IT environment. IT professionals need to spend time defining these policies so there are rules for capabilities, such as information mobility, to satisfy business demands. This allows you to integrate your IT policy governance and compliance efforts into your organization's broader governance, risk and compliance strategy.
About the report: The report released today is the second in a series that provides lessons learned, proven best practices and expert guidance on how to transform information into business value. EMC expects to publish additional reports from the Leadership Council for Information Advantage in the coming months.
Contact: http://www.EMC.com
Contact: http://www.CouncilForInformationAdvantage.com
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Most Companies Believe Sensitive Data Can Be Secured in the Cloud
Most companies believe sensitive data can be secured in the cloud, a survey has found.
In addition, nearly half of the respondents also said they believe cloud-based solutions can be as secure as on-premise products, with over 40 percent stating they would consider replacing current solutions with cloud-based ones.
However, respondents did keep their feet on the ground with clear caveats that cloud solutions must include strong data protection, data segregation and the ability to comply with key compliance mandates, such as Sarbanes Oxley, HIPAA and PCI DSS. Compliance was noted as mission critical by nearly 80 percent of those surveyed, and most respondents felt there was some data still too risky to put in the cloud, including intellectual property, financial information and employee records. The survey also showed most companies are willing to forego performance for cloud security, with nearly 80 percent saying they would sacrifice some cloud computing performance in order to ensure that the data was secure.
In the end, it comes down to whether or not a cloud vendor can address the top criteria for cloud security, which are: data protection (85 percent), auditing and tracking (53 percent), access control rules and securing data in motion (both at 36 percent).
For cloud vendors, the survey clearly reveals the most important criteria for companies evaluating a cloud vendor. Respondents placed greatest importance how their data is segregated from other customers (85 percent), whether or not the vendor has a comprehensive and secure disaster recovery plan in place (80 percent), understanding how their company data is secured within the application (79 percent), and understanding the vendor's security breach contingency process (72 percent). Access control rules, strong authentication and best-of-breed network security infrastructure were some of the other criteria near the top of the list when considering cloud providers.
Comment from Margaret Dawson, vice president of marketing and product management at Hubspan: The results of this survey show that while some of the concerns over cloud security may be overblown, vendors must be able to clearly show how they address data segregation, compliance and other areas critical to businesses interested in augmenting on-premise infrastructure with cloud-based solutions. These results mirror what we hear from our own customers, and Hubspan has been ahead of the game in providing best-in-class security and compliance-based B2B integration in the cloud.
About the survey: More than 200 companies completed the cloud survey, ranging in size from under 50 to several thousand employees. Respondents represented a range of industries, with high-tech, manufacturing, wholesale distribution, retail and B2B eCommerce accounting for 50 percent of the polls.
Contact: http://www.hubspan.com
In addition, nearly half of the respondents also said they believe cloud-based solutions can be as secure as on-premise products, with over 40 percent stating they would consider replacing current solutions with cloud-based ones.
However, respondents did keep their feet on the ground with clear caveats that cloud solutions must include strong data protection, data segregation and the ability to comply with key compliance mandates, such as Sarbanes Oxley, HIPAA and PCI DSS. Compliance was noted as mission critical by nearly 80 percent of those surveyed, and most respondents felt there was some data still too risky to put in the cloud, including intellectual property, financial information and employee records. The survey also showed most companies are willing to forego performance for cloud security, with nearly 80 percent saying they would sacrifice some cloud computing performance in order to ensure that the data was secure.
In the end, it comes down to whether or not a cloud vendor can address the top criteria for cloud security, which are: data protection (85 percent), auditing and tracking (53 percent), access control rules and securing data in motion (both at 36 percent).
For cloud vendors, the survey clearly reveals the most important criteria for companies evaluating a cloud vendor. Respondents placed greatest importance how their data is segregated from other customers (85 percent), whether or not the vendor has a comprehensive and secure disaster recovery plan in place (80 percent), understanding how their company data is secured within the application (79 percent), and understanding the vendor's security breach contingency process (72 percent). Access control rules, strong authentication and best-of-breed network security infrastructure were some of the other criteria near the top of the list when considering cloud providers.
Comment from Margaret Dawson, vice president of marketing and product management at Hubspan: The results of this survey show that while some of the concerns over cloud security may be overblown, vendors must be able to clearly show how they address data segregation, compliance and other areas critical to businesses interested in augmenting on-premise infrastructure with cloud-based solutions. These results mirror what we hear from our own customers, and Hubspan has been ahead of the game in providing best-in-class security and compliance-based B2B integration in the cloud.
About the survey: More than 200 companies completed the cloud survey, ranging in size from under 50 to several thousand employees. Respondents represented a range of industries, with high-tech, manufacturing, wholesale distribution, retail and B2B eCommerce accounting for 50 percent of the polls.
Contact: http://www.hubspan.com
Mainframe Plays Critical Role In Cloud-Connected Enterprise
Mainframe computers continue to play a critical role in enterprise computing, have a key role in many companies' cloud-connected enterprise strategies, and the availability and development of critical mainframe skills remains a concern, according to a survey.
A significant majority (80 percent) of respondents named the mainframe as an important part of their current business strategy, and as part of their cloud plans (73 percent), and cited concerns about proficiency levels of recent college graduates as cause for concern when looking at sourcing the next generation of mainframe personnel.
The need for skilled mainframe workers becomes even more critical as companies look to leverage the mainframe as a key component of evolving plans for cloud adoption. More than two-thirds (73 percent) of respondents confirmed that the mainframe is -- or will be -- part of their organization's cloud computing strategy.
Among the survey's other significant findings:
1) Increased Mainframe Investment
-- A majority (80 percent) responded they will be maintaining or increasing spend on mainframe staff in the next 12-18 months.
-- More than three-fourths (76 percent) will maintain or increase their investment in mainframe software during the next 12-18 months.
-- Nearly half of respondents (46 percent) are looking for industry leadership from vendors on the evolving role of the mainframe in the enterprise.
2) Difficulty in Sourcing and Training Mainframe Talent
-- Nearly the same percentage of respondents (61 percent) don't believe the IT industry does enough to promote mainframe career opportunities to recent graduates.
-- 35 percent believe that recent graduates are not as proficient in mainframe technology as their counterparts that entered the workforce 10-years ago.
-- 61 percent said that hiring either took much longer than expected, took long enough to negatively impact their IT operation or are still looking for talent after more than six months.
3) Leveraging Social Media in Hiring
-- As the industry seeks to bolster mainframe education and careers in technology, companies will continue to hire. More than half (52 percent) of those surveyed cited social media networking platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn as the most effective recruiting tools. Fifty six percent indicated that they would like IT vendors to provide insights on the next generation of mainframe personnel, as they too, are feeling the staffing squeeze.
Comment from Dayton Semerjian, general manager, Mainframe, CA Technologies: With the resurgence of the mainframe underway and the recent release of IBM's zEnterprise hardware, it's clear that the mainframe is here to stay and will remain a critical component of enterprise data center as companies develop cloud strategies.
About the survey: The survey "Mainframe as a Mainstay" was conducted by Decipher Research, a marketing research services provider based in the U.S. Decipher surveyed 200 U.S. mainframe executives during September and October 2010.
Contact: http://www.ca.com
A significant majority (80 percent) of respondents named the mainframe as an important part of their current business strategy, and as part of their cloud plans (73 percent), and cited concerns about proficiency levels of recent college graduates as cause for concern when looking at sourcing the next generation of mainframe personnel.
The need for skilled mainframe workers becomes even more critical as companies look to leverage the mainframe as a key component of evolving plans for cloud adoption. More than two-thirds (73 percent) of respondents confirmed that the mainframe is -- or will be -- part of their organization's cloud computing strategy.
Among the survey's other significant findings:
1) Increased Mainframe Investment
-- A majority (80 percent) responded they will be maintaining or increasing spend on mainframe staff in the next 12-18 months.
-- More than three-fourths (76 percent) will maintain or increase their investment in mainframe software during the next 12-18 months.
-- Nearly half of respondents (46 percent) are looking for industry leadership from vendors on the evolving role of the mainframe in the enterprise.
2) Difficulty in Sourcing and Training Mainframe Talent
-- Nearly the same percentage of respondents (61 percent) don't believe the IT industry does enough to promote mainframe career opportunities to recent graduates.
-- 35 percent believe that recent graduates are not as proficient in mainframe technology as their counterparts that entered the workforce 10-years ago.
-- 61 percent said that hiring either took much longer than expected, took long enough to negatively impact their IT operation or are still looking for talent after more than six months.
3) Leveraging Social Media in Hiring
-- As the industry seeks to bolster mainframe education and careers in technology, companies will continue to hire. More than half (52 percent) of those surveyed cited social media networking platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn as the most effective recruiting tools. Fifty six percent indicated that they would like IT vendors to provide insights on the next generation of mainframe personnel, as they too, are feeling the staffing squeeze.
Comment from Dayton Semerjian, general manager, Mainframe, CA Technologies: With the resurgence of the mainframe underway and the recent release of IBM's zEnterprise hardware, it's clear that the mainframe is here to stay and will remain a critical component of enterprise data center as companies develop cloud strategies.
About the survey: The survey "Mainframe as a Mainstay" was conducted by Decipher Research, a marketing research services provider based in the U.S. Decipher surveyed 200 U.S. mainframe executives during September and October 2010.
Contact: http://www.ca.com
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Cloud Deployment Likely To Accelerate This Year
Adoption of cloud computing has lagged behind media buzz, but growth in cloud deployments is likely to accelerate in the coming year, according to a survey.
Other findings:
-- Half won't commit for five years: While genuine interest in the cloud is growing, nearly 40 percent of respondents indicated their organizations had no plans to use cloud services. As a result, the adoption curve for cloud computing will not follow the bell curve typical of most new technologies. After an initial surge of adoption, growth will slow until remaining companies see proof of success from early adopters. Once a critical mass of users establishes success, competitive pressures will force the remaining companies to adopt cloud services.
-- Cloud platform supremacy: the battle intensifies: Only three percent of respondents selected a primary cloud platform, with selections evenly split between Microsoft Azure Services Platform, Google App Engine and Amazon Web Services, indicating the competition for market dominance is still wide open and likely will intensify.
-- New support teams emerge to lasso the cloud: The survey found the first signs of organizational change with the emergence of new administrative teams dedicated to supporting cloud services. Leading-edge companies recognize that provisioning and support of cloud services will be fundamentally different than current application delivery models.
-- IT will adopt e-mail cloud services first: Survey results showed people are most interested in e-mail as a cloud service. Approximately 50 percent of the companies using, currently evaluating, or planning to deploy cloud services have or are considering e-mail. Enterprises are waiting for e-mail offerings to mature, however, with truly widespread adoption still likely years, rather than months, away.
-- "Best-of-breed" trumps standardization as more cloud decisions are made outside IT: The ease of use and scalability of many cloud solutions enables business area managers to choose their own platforms and applications rather than rely on centralized decisions by IT organizations. Survey respondents' relatively low interest in customer relationship management (CRM) is inconsistent with the popularity of Salesforce.com and other cloud-delivered CRM services, indicating that IT organizations are not involved in, and may not even be aware of, all cloud services used within their enterprises.
-- Small cloud service contingency plans spell big trouble: Cost reduction is cited by 34 percent of survey respondents as the primary driver for considering cloud services. Yet, the newness of cloud service delivery models coupled with this strong focus on cost reduction means some IT organizations will underestimate the need for proper contingency planning for service outages.
-- Federation will become IT delivery standard: Use of federation to share identity information across domains and enable business users to access multiple systems and services has grown steadily over the past several years. Twenty-four percent of survey respondents already deploy federation, and another nine percent plan to deploy it within the next 12 months.
-- E-discovery, compliance and security will drive increased Exchange support spending: More than 40 percent of respondents reported their resource requirements for e-discovery support and security increased over the past year, perhaps due to increasing regulatory oversight, litigation levels, or pressure to protect corporate information. Thirty-one percent saw growth in resources needed for compliance reporting and supporting audit requirements, and 70 percent were less than satisfied with their e-mail compliance processes. E-discovery, compliance and security likely will be the primary drivers of increases in Exchange support spending in 2011.
-- Fight will continue on desktop and storage battlegrounds: Ninety-one percent of TEC respondents are already using virtualization in production, and most of the rest are either evaluating or planning to deploy within the next 12 months. Server virtualization is either in use or under evaluation by 94 percent of responding organizations, and the market has reached saturation. Desktop virtualization still has room for growth in adoption, with current use at 46 percent in responding organizations. Storage virtualization currently is used by only 24 percent of responding organizations.
-- Technology investment strategies will forego cost-cutting, embrace opportunity: While many companies and government organizations still tightly control spending, responses on the TEC survey show promising signs of economic improvement. Only nine percent of responding companies are still cutting back, while 54 percent are making at least targeted investments. As the economy continues to improve and companies seek to accelerate revenue growth, there will be an increasing shift from cost-cutting purchases to more opportunity-based technology investments.
Comment from Gil Kirkpatrick, Quest chief architect and conference founder: Taken together, these predictions paint a picture of the key priorities of IT organizations and the technology market dynamics we can expect in 2011. We're excited to share these insights on the complexities of adoption behind the cloud buzz, platform vendor battles and shifting technology investment strategies.
About the survey: Quest Software, Inc.'s technology predictions for 2011are based on results of its annual survey conducted at The Experts Conference (TEC) U.S., hosted earlier this year by Quest. Survey results were analyzed by Quest experts to extract key insights and compelling trends. Results are based on analysis of this year's TEC conference survey responses from in-the-trenches IT practitioners, as well as historical perspective gleaned from conducting annual surveys.
Contact: http://www.theexpertsconference.com/us/2011/general-information/2010-us-survey-results
Contact: http://www.quest.com
Other findings:
-- Half won't commit for five years: While genuine interest in the cloud is growing, nearly 40 percent of respondents indicated their organizations had no plans to use cloud services. As a result, the adoption curve for cloud computing will not follow the bell curve typical of most new technologies. After an initial surge of adoption, growth will slow until remaining companies see proof of success from early adopters. Once a critical mass of users establishes success, competitive pressures will force the remaining companies to adopt cloud services.
-- Cloud platform supremacy: the battle intensifies: Only three percent of respondents selected a primary cloud platform, with selections evenly split between Microsoft Azure Services Platform, Google App Engine and Amazon Web Services, indicating the competition for market dominance is still wide open and likely will intensify.
-- New support teams emerge to lasso the cloud: The survey found the first signs of organizational change with the emergence of new administrative teams dedicated to supporting cloud services. Leading-edge companies recognize that provisioning and support of cloud services will be fundamentally different than current application delivery models.
-- IT will adopt e-mail cloud services first: Survey results showed people are most interested in e-mail as a cloud service. Approximately 50 percent of the companies using, currently evaluating, or planning to deploy cloud services have or are considering e-mail. Enterprises are waiting for e-mail offerings to mature, however, with truly widespread adoption still likely years, rather than months, away.
-- "Best-of-breed" trumps standardization as more cloud decisions are made outside IT: The ease of use and scalability of many cloud solutions enables business area managers to choose their own platforms and applications rather than rely on centralized decisions by IT organizations. Survey respondents' relatively low interest in customer relationship management (CRM) is inconsistent with the popularity of Salesforce.com and other cloud-delivered CRM services, indicating that IT organizations are not involved in, and may not even be aware of, all cloud services used within their enterprises.
-- Small cloud service contingency plans spell big trouble: Cost reduction is cited by 34 percent of survey respondents as the primary driver for considering cloud services. Yet, the newness of cloud service delivery models coupled with this strong focus on cost reduction means some IT organizations will underestimate the need for proper contingency planning for service outages.
-- Federation will become IT delivery standard: Use of federation to share identity information across domains and enable business users to access multiple systems and services has grown steadily over the past several years. Twenty-four percent of survey respondents already deploy federation, and another nine percent plan to deploy it within the next 12 months.
-- E-discovery, compliance and security will drive increased Exchange support spending: More than 40 percent of respondents reported their resource requirements for e-discovery support and security increased over the past year, perhaps due to increasing regulatory oversight, litigation levels, or pressure to protect corporate information. Thirty-one percent saw growth in resources needed for compliance reporting and supporting audit requirements, and 70 percent were less than satisfied with their e-mail compliance processes. E-discovery, compliance and security likely will be the primary drivers of increases in Exchange support spending in 2011.
-- Fight will continue on desktop and storage battlegrounds: Ninety-one percent of TEC respondents are already using virtualization in production, and most of the rest are either evaluating or planning to deploy within the next 12 months. Server virtualization is either in use or under evaluation by 94 percent of responding organizations, and the market has reached saturation. Desktop virtualization still has room for growth in adoption, with current use at 46 percent in responding organizations. Storage virtualization currently is used by only 24 percent of responding organizations.
-- Technology investment strategies will forego cost-cutting, embrace opportunity: While many companies and government organizations still tightly control spending, responses on the TEC survey show promising signs of economic improvement. Only nine percent of responding companies are still cutting back, while 54 percent are making at least targeted investments. As the economy continues to improve and companies seek to accelerate revenue growth, there will be an increasing shift from cost-cutting purchases to more opportunity-based technology investments.
Comment from Gil Kirkpatrick, Quest chief architect and conference founder: Taken together, these predictions paint a picture of the key priorities of IT organizations and the technology market dynamics we can expect in 2011. We're excited to share these insights on the complexities of adoption behind the cloud buzz, platform vendor battles and shifting technology investment strategies.
About the survey: Quest Software, Inc.'s technology predictions for 2011are based on results of its annual survey conducted at The Experts Conference (TEC) U.S., hosted earlier this year by Quest. Survey results were analyzed by Quest experts to extract key insights and compelling trends. Results are based on analysis of this year's TEC conference survey responses from in-the-trenches IT practitioners, as well as historical perspective gleaned from conducting annual surveys.
Contact: http://www.theexpertsconference.com/us/2011/general-information/2010-us-survey-results
Contact: http://www.quest.com
Friday, November 12, 2010
Investment In Cloud Computing Is Rising; Resistance To SaaS ERP Declining
Thirty-nine percent of respondents to a survey are willing to consider Software as a Service (SaaS) as a deployment option for their Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) implementations. This is a 61 percent increase in the willingness to consider SaaS from 2009 to 2010. Not only do we see a significant increase in willingness to consider SaaS or on-demand as a deployment method, but also notable is the decreased willingness to consider the traditional licensed on-premise option, which dropped by almost 18 percent.
Seventy-nine percent of survey respondents are considering SaaS because of the lower total cost of ownership. They are also considering it because it reduces the cost of upgrades and because they have limited IT resources and no interest in building IT staff. Because of this, 2010 could very well be the year in which SaaS ERP really gains strength in the marketplace.
Comment from Cindy Jutras, vice president research fellow and group director, Aberdeen: Since 2007 Aberdeen has been keeping watch on deployment models of ERP. In July 2007, we characterized ERP as the Last Bastion of Resistance to Software as a Service (SaaS). In June 2008 we revisited the topic and found SaaS ERP had not kept pace with the hype-cycle of other SaaS enterprise applications. Eighteen months later (at the end of 2009), in spite of the surge in interest in cloud computing and virtualization and the availability of SaaS ERP options from an increasing number of solution providers, SaaS ERP had yet to "take off." Finally in mid-2010 we are seeing an overall 61 percent jump in willingness to consider SaaS ERP. Will 2010 finally be the year when those walls of resistance come tumbling down? Or will they just fade away and leave us at the dawn of 2011 wondering what the fuss was all about?
About the report: SaaS ERP: Trends & Observations 2010 from Aberdeen Group is available at the Web site.
Contact: http://www.aberdeen.com
Seventy-nine percent of survey respondents are considering SaaS because of the lower total cost of ownership. They are also considering it because it reduces the cost of upgrades and because they have limited IT resources and no interest in building IT staff. Because of this, 2010 could very well be the year in which SaaS ERP really gains strength in the marketplace.
Comment from Cindy Jutras, vice president research fellow and group director, Aberdeen: Since 2007 Aberdeen has been keeping watch on deployment models of ERP. In July 2007, we characterized ERP as the Last Bastion of Resistance to Software as a Service (SaaS). In June 2008 we revisited the topic and found SaaS ERP had not kept pace with the hype-cycle of other SaaS enterprise applications. Eighteen months later (at the end of 2009), in spite of the surge in interest in cloud computing and virtualization and the availability of SaaS ERP options from an increasing number of solution providers, SaaS ERP had yet to "take off." Finally in mid-2010 we are seeing an overall 61 percent jump in willingness to consider SaaS ERP. Will 2010 finally be the year when those walls of resistance come tumbling down? Or will they just fade away and leave us at the dawn of 2011 wondering what the fuss was all about?
About the report: SaaS ERP: Trends & Observations 2010 from Aberdeen Group is available at the Web site.
Contact: http://www.aberdeen.com
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Majority Of Organizations Still Receive Paper Invoices
More than 70 percent of organizations receive over three quarters of their invoices in paper form, according to a recent survey. While automating invoice processing can reduce costs by 75 to 90 percent, more than half of the 100 respondents cited the perceived cost and resources required with on-premise software as barriers to automation.
Comment from Toby Bell, research vice president at Gartner: Many factors are prompting businesses to focus on enterprise content management (ECM) as part of a shift toward a SaaS or cloud model. The attractions for applications like invoice processing are obvious as it brings with it fewer costs for infrastructure hardware, software and management, and less complexity in the applications layer.
Comment from Roger Bottum, vice president of marketing, SpringCM: The impact on SG&A and risk reduction are obvious to most organizations. On-premise delivery models have been a barrier. But now with cloud solutions, automating the invoice process can be easy, fast and affordable to address.
About the survey: The survey was conducted by SpringCM, a specialist in cloud enterprise content management.
Contact: http://www.springcm.com
Comment from Toby Bell, research vice president at Gartner: Many factors are prompting businesses to focus on enterprise content management (ECM) as part of a shift toward a SaaS or cloud model. The attractions for applications like invoice processing are obvious as it brings with it fewer costs for infrastructure hardware, software and management, and less complexity in the applications layer.
Comment from Roger Bottum, vice president of marketing, SpringCM: The impact on SG&A and risk reduction are obvious to most organizations. On-premise delivery models have been a barrier. But now with cloud solutions, automating the invoice process can be easy, fast and affordable to address.
About the survey: The survey was conducted by SpringCM, a specialist in cloud enterprise content management.
Contact: http://www.springcm.com
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
CIOs Look To Improve Key Business Processes In 2011
Sixty-eight percent of 347 IT professionals who responded to a recent survey said they are expected to deliver tighter application and business process integration, creating more value for the business without significantly adding to the IT budget. Examples include integrating the order-to-cash and procure-to-pay process chains to improve cash flow.
IT professionals on both continents are being pressed to help their companies build a leaner, more agile and competitive business. Other high ranking responses included how to better exploit cloud computing, increasing the use of virtual machines to maximize flexibility and reduce costs, and implementing/extending service-oriented architectures (SOA) to extend the ROI of existing IT assets.
The survey results validate the belief that IT budgets remain tight and enterprise-wide transformational programs have been replaced by less risky, targeted projects that cost less and deliver more immediate results. Also apparent from the consistency of issues related by such a wide range of IT professionals is that, while companies are looking at more targeted projects, they are taking a more holistic approach, addressing the business purpose of the process, the human interaction with the process, process execution and monitoring, and managing the infrastructure required to run the process. Optimizing the business value of key processes lies at the heart of the results.
Comment from Gartner Research analyst Janelle B. Hill: Most companies no longer have the luxury of funding efforts that may succeed eventually; they want guaranteed business results in shorter time frames.
Comment from Andrew Evers, Redwood Software CTO: In this environment CIOs are expecting their organizations to work smarter and increase business agility while absolutely holding the line on costs. They are asking every department to contribute to and own the company's success. The results clearly demonstrate that IT business models have changed.
About the survey: Redwood Software conducted the 2010 IT Priorities survey on workload automation at the SAP TechEd conferences in Berlin, October 12-14, and Las Vegas, October 18-22, among process management IT professionals such as ERP directors, business process managers, application architects and others.
Contact: http://www.redwood.com
IT professionals on both continents are being pressed to help their companies build a leaner, more agile and competitive business. Other high ranking responses included how to better exploit cloud computing, increasing the use of virtual machines to maximize flexibility and reduce costs, and implementing/extending service-oriented architectures (SOA) to extend the ROI of existing IT assets.
The survey results validate the belief that IT budgets remain tight and enterprise-wide transformational programs have been replaced by less risky, targeted projects that cost less and deliver more immediate results. Also apparent from the consistency of issues related by such a wide range of IT professionals is that, while companies are looking at more targeted projects, they are taking a more holistic approach, addressing the business purpose of the process, the human interaction with the process, process execution and monitoring, and managing the infrastructure required to run the process. Optimizing the business value of key processes lies at the heart of the results.
Comment from Gartner Research analyst Janelle B. Hill: Most companies no longer have the luxury of funding efforts that may succeed eventually; they want guaranteed business results in shorter time frames.
Comment from Andrew Evers, Redwood Software CTO: In this environment CIOs are expecting their organizations to work smarter and increase business agility while absolutely holding the line on costs. They are asking every department to contribute to and own the company's success. The results clearly demonstrate that IT business models have changed.
About the survey: Redwood Software conducted the 2010 IT Priorities survey on workload automation at the SAP TechEd conferences in Berlin, October 12-14, and Las Vegas, October 18-22, among process management IT professionals such as ERP directors, business process managers, application architects and others.
Contact: http://www.redwood.com
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Application Performance Management Is Critical When Moving To The Cloud
Demand for application performance management is growing when moving applications to the cloud, according to a recent survey.
Key areas were surveyed to better understand plans for consolidation and virtualization; which applications would be cloud-enabled; attitudes toward using WAN optimization or APM solutions and service level agreements (SLAs) requirements.
The majority of MNC respondents indicate that Web conferencing, video conferencing and Microsoft applications are the most likely applications to be virtualized or cloud-enabled. Only 95 of the 500 companies plan to virtualize their call center applications and even fewer plan to virtualize customer relationship management, enterprise resource planning, human resources, or other applications. The selection of applications for the cloud is based on those that are used "off-the-shelf" versus those that are typically customized for unique business use.
The study shows most companies, 67.6 percent, plan to consolidate data centers and servers within the next two years, further validating that consolidation continues to be driven by cost reduction and centralization.
European multinationals' use of WAN optimization or an application delivery performance solution is mixed. Though 54.4 percent already have a solution in place, 45.6 percent indicate that they still do not currently use WAN optimization or an application delivery performance solution. With new access technologies and bandwidth costs varying by region, performance can be achieved without any solution. However, economic challenges continue to compel bandwidth savings and cost reduction as key drivers for MNCs knowing that bandwidth will not resolve application-specific protocol issues and guarantee end-user experience.
When asked about service level agreements (SLAs), 69.1 percent expect to have application-level SLAs such as application availability, while 55.9 percent expect managed network services SLAs such as round trip delay, packet loss and jitter.
Comment from Jean Critcher, Solution Director at Orange Business Services: As this study shows, WAN optimization and APM continue to be important to MNCs and most especially when they are moving to the cloud. As a continuance to achieve the fastest means to cost reduction, these solutions become more justified. Our customers who use WAN optimization and APM solutions from Orange benefit from double-digit savings to TCO and improvements to productivity while seeing ROI within a year.
About the survey: Orange Business Services assessed application performance management (APM) plans and attitudes among decision makers from 500 multinational corporations (MNC) in 12 European countries(1) across various industry sectors including financial services, health care, manufacturing, retail and transportation. The complete survey results are available online in a report titled "Application Performance Management: maintaining performance, productivity and getting ready for the cloud."
Contact: http://www.orange.com
Key areas were surveyed to better understand plans for consolidation and virtualization; which applications would be cloud-enabled; attitudes toward using WAN optimization or APM solutions and service level agreements (SLAs) requirements.
The majority of MNC respondents indicate that Web conferencing, video conferencing and Microsoft applications are the most likely applications to be virtualized or cloud-enabled. Only 95 of the 500 companies plan to virtualize their call center applications and even fewer plan to virtualize customer relationship management, enterprise resource planning, human resources, or other applications. The selection of applications for the cloud is based on those that are used "off-the-shelf" versus those that are typically customized for unique business use.
The study shows most companies, 67.6 percent, plan to consolidate data centers and servers within the next two years, further validating that consolidation continues to be driven by cost reduction and centralization.
European multinationals' use of WAN optimization or an application delivery performance solution is mixed. Though 54.4 percent already have a solution in place, 45.6 percent indicate that they still do not currently use WAN optimization or an application delivery performance solution. With new access technologies and bandwidth costs varying by region, performance can be achieved without any solution. However, economic challenges continue to compel bandwidth savings and cost reduction as key drivers for MNCs knowing that bandwidth will not resolve application-specific protocol issues and guarantee end-user experience.
When asked about service level agreements (SLAs), 69.1 percent expect to have application-level SLAs such as application availability, while 55.9 percent expect managed network services SLAs such as round trip delay, packet loss and jitter.
Comment from Jean Critcher, Solution Director at Orange Business Services: As this study shows, WAN optimization and APM continue to be important to MNCs and most especially when they are moving to the cloud. As a continuance to achieve the fastest means to cost reduction, these solutions become more justified. Our customers who use WAN optimization and APM solutions from Orange benefit from double-digit savings to TCO and improvements to productivity while seeing ROI within a year.
About the survey: Orange Business Services assessed application performance management (APM) plans and attitudes among decision makers from 500 multinational corporations (MNC) in 12 European countries(1) across various industry sectors including financial services, health care, manufacturing, retail and transportation. The complete survey results are available online in a report titled "Application Performance Management: maintaining performance, productivity and getting ready for the cloud."
Contact: http://www.orange.com
Consumer Devices, Social Media and Video May Be Causing Company IT Policies To Bend Or Break
There is a disconnect between IT policies and workers, especially as employees strive to work in a more mobile fashion and use numerous devices, social media and new forms of communication such as video, a new survey has found. As technology trends alter the way businesses communicate and operate, more than two-thirds of workers surveyed believed their companies' IT policies could be improved, and at least two of every five (41 percent) said they break those policies to meet their needs.
Key findings:
1. Employee Awareness and Adherence to IT Policies
-- The study revealed that while most companies have IT policies (82 percent), about one in four employees (24 percent) are unaware that such policies exist. An additional 23 percent reported that their companies do not have IT policies on acceptable device usage. When combined, almost half of the workers in the study (47 percent) either do not have an IT policy on device usage or do not know that one exists.
-- For those employees who have an IT policy, 35 percent say IT does not provide an explanation or rationale for why it exists, which can result in apathy, misunderstanding and selective compliance.
-- Among workers aware of IT policy, about two of three (64 percent) feel it could use some improvement. These employees believe policies could be updated to reflect real-world needs and work styles, such as finding an acceptable medium between device usage, social media, mobility and work flexibility.
-- Of those employees who admit to breaking IT policies, about two of every five (41 percent) say it's because they need restricted programs and applications to get the job done -- they're simply trying to be more productive and efficient.
-- One of five (20 percent) employees worldwide said they break IT policy because they believe their company or IT team will not enforce it.
-- This research points to an issue among many businesses worldwide: the need to re-evaluate and update IT policies to align with the growing reality of a workforce that is demanding more enablement to be connected anywhere, anytime, with any device and any information in their work and personal lives.
2. IT Policy Toward Employee Use of Social Media, Devices
-- Social media use is restricted to varying degrees around the world and per company. Although half (51 percent) of the employees surveyed worldwide believe social media, while not work-related, contributes to work-life balance, two of five (41 percent) said they are restricted from using Facebook at their job, and one of three (35 percent) is restricted from using Twitter at work or with work devices.
-- More than one in four (28 percent) workers are restricted from using instant messaging at work or with work devices, and one in five (21 percent) are restricted from doing personal e-mail on work devices and during work hours.
-- Two of every three employees (64 percent) believe their IT teams and companies should loosen up and allow social media use during work hours with work devices, citing work-life balance as a key reason, particularly because many of them can work in a mobile, distributed fashion and put in longer hours as a result.
-- The use of personal devices like iPads and iPhones is also restricted to some degree. Globally, almost one in five (18 percent) employees are not allowed to use their iPods at work, and almost one in five (18 percent) are restricted from using personal devices like employee-owned laptops or phones.
-- The majority of employees (66 percent) believe they should be able to connect freely with any device -- personal or company-issued -- and access the applications and information that they need around the clock. Policy or no policy, many employees will simply do it, raising the question about how effective a policy is and how IT can update, enforce and ensure better compliance.
3. The Rise of Video in the Workplace
-- The use of video is on the rise as a form of consumer and enterprise communication. Globally, more than two-thirds of IT professionals (68 percent) feel that the importance of video communications to their company will increase in the future. This sentiment is particularly true among those in Mexico (85 percent), China (85 percent), Brazil (82 percent), and Spain (82 percent).
-- However, not all employees who wish to use video communications in the workplace are able to do so today. About two in five employees (41percent) said they cannot use video as a communications tool at work, with more than half of employees in the United States (53 percent), the United Kingdom (55 percent), Germany (55 percent) and France (60 percent) not having the capability of using video for workplace communications.
Comment from Marie Hattar, vice president, Borderless Networks, Cisco: The time spent between work and personal lives has blurred. Employees expect to access networks, applications and information anywhere, at any time, on any device. With the expansion of diverse devices in the workplace, along with the growth of video as a favored mode of communication, IT organizations are facing many policy and management demands on their networking infrastructure. The good news is that IT departments can allow employees to be productive and satisfy their desire to socially network on consumer or company-issued devices through the agility and flexibility provided by a Cisco Borderless Network Architecture.
Comment from Nasrin Rezai, senior director, Cisco Security: While most companies have IT policies, employees are not always aware of or knowledgeable about them. For those employees who are cognizant, policies are not always considered up-to-date or reflective of real-world business and lifestyle expectations, and as a result they are broken many times. The Cisco Connected World Report spotlights the disconnect between IT, employees and policies. As workforces become more distributed and the consumerization of IT becomes a fact of mainstream life, the importance of updating appropriate policies to accommodate employee needs while balancing risk and security becomes critical.
About the study: The study was commissioned by Cisco and conducted by InsightExpress, a third-party market research firm based in the United States. Cisco commissioned the study to maintain its understanding of present-day challenges that companies face as they strive to address employee and business needs amid increasing mobility capabilities, security risks, and technologies that can deliver applications and information more ubiquitously -- from virtualized data centers and cloud computing to traditional wired and wireless networks.
Contact: http://www.cisco.com
Key findings:
1. Employee Awareness and Adherence to IT Policies
-- The study revealed that while most companies have IT policies (82 percent), about one in four employees (24 percent) are unaware that such policies exist. An additional 23 percent reported that their companies do not have IT policies on acceptable device usage. When combined, almost half of the workers in the study (47 percent) either do not have an IT policy on device usage or do not know that one exists.
-- For those employees who have an IT policy, 35 percent say IT does not provide an explanation or rationale for why it exists, which can result in apathy, misunderstanding and selective compliance.
-- Among workers aware of IT policy, about two of three (64 percent) feel it could use some improvement. These employees believe policies could be updated to reflect real-world needs and work styles, such as finding an acceptable medium between device usage, social media, mobility and work flexibility.
-- Of those employees who admit to breaking IT policies, about two of every five (41 percent) say it's because they need restricted programs and applications to get the job done -- they're simply trying to be more productive and efficient.
-- One of five (20 percent) employees worldwide said they break IT policy because they believe their company or IT team will not enforce it.
-- This research points to an issue among many businesses worldwide: the need to re-evaluate and update IT policies to align with the growing reality of a workforce that is demanding more enablement to be connected anywhere, anytime, with any device and any information in their work and personal lives.
2. IT Policy Toward Employee Use of Social Media, Devices
-- Social media use is restricted to varying degrees around the world and per company. Although half (51 percent) of the employees surveyed worldwide believe social media, while not work-related, contributes to work-life balance, two of five (41 percent) said they are restricted from using Facebook at their job, and one of three (35 percent) is restricted from using Twitter at work or with work devices.
-- More than one in four (28 percent) workers are restricted from using instant messaging at work or with work devices, and one in five (21 percent) are restricted from doing personal e-mail on work devices and during work hours.
-- Two of every three employees (64 percent) believe their IT teams and companies should loosen up and allow social media use during work hours with work devices, citing work-life balance as a key reason, particularly because many of them can work in a mobile, distributed fashion and put in longer hours as a result.
-- The use of personal devices like iPads and iPhones is also restricted to some degree. Globally, almost one in five (18 percent) employees are not allowed to use their iPods at work, and almost one in five (18 percent) are restricted from using personal devices like employee-owned laptops or phones.
-- The majority of employees (66 percent) believe they should be able to connect freely with any device -- personal or company-issued -- and access the applications and information that they need around the clock. Policy or no policy, many employees will simply do it, raising the question about how effective a policy is and how IT can update, enforce and ensure better compliance.
3. The Rise of Video in the Workplace
-- The use of video is on the rise as a form of consumer and enterprise communication. Globally, more than two-thirds of IT professionals (68 percent) feel that the importance of video communications to their company will increase in the future. This sentiment is particularly true among those in Mexico (85 percent), China (85 percent), Brazil (82 percent), and Spain (82 percent).
-- However, not all employees who wish to use video communications in the workplace are able to do so today. About two in five employees (41percent) said they cannot use video as a communications tool at work, with more than half of employees in the United States (53 percent), the United Kingdom (55 percent), Germany (55 percent) and France (60 percent) not having the capability of using video for workplace communications.
Comment from Marie Hattar, vice president, Borderless Networks, Cisco: The time spent between work and personal lives has blurred. Employees expect to access networks, applications and information anywhere, at any time, on any device. With the expansion of diverse devices in the workplace, along with the growth of video as a favored mode of communication, IT organizations are facing many policy and management demands on their networking infrastructure. The good news is that IT departments can allow employees to be productive and satisfy their desire to socially network on consumer or company-issued devices through the agility and flexibility provided by a Cisco Borderless Network Architecture.
Comment from Nasrin Rezai, senior director, Cisco Security: While most companies have IT policies, employees are not always aware of or knowledgeable about them. For those employees who are cognizant, policies are not always considered up-to-date or reflective of real-world business and lifestyle expectations, and as a result they are broken many times. The Cisco Connected World Report spotlights the disconnect between IT, employees and policies. As workforces become more distributed and the consumerization of IT becomes a fact of mainstream life, the importance of updating appropriate policies to accommodate employee needs while balancing risk and security becomes critical.
About the study: The study was commissioned by Cisco and conducted by InsightExpress, a third-party market research firm based in the United States. Cisco commissioned the study to maintain its understanding of present-day challenges that companies face as they strive to address employee and business needs amid increasing mobility capabilities, security risks, and technologies that can deliver applications and information more ubiquitously -- from virtualized data centers and cloud computing to traditional wired and wireless networks.
Contact: http://www.cisco.com
Friday, November 5, 2010
Cloud Computing Adoption Presents Significant Security Risks
Though organizations are increasing spending to protect data, many still feel pressured to reduce IT expenditures in other areas, leading them to look externally for efficient solutions, according to a new survey.
Despite an unproven track record, 45 percent of organizations are currently using, evaluating or planning to use cloud computing services within the next 12 months. The risks associated with cloud computing include data leakage, with 52 percent identifying it as the largest associated risk, followed by 39 percent who cite the lost visibility of company data as an increased risk of cloud-based solutions.
However, most respondents (85 percent) indicate that external certification of cloud service providers would help to evaluate security controls and increase trust.
Evidence also suggests that few organizations have fully assessed the risks associated with social networking. Just one-third report that social media presents a considerable information security challenge and only 10 percent say examining new and emerging IT trends is a very important information security function.
The focus in information security is shifting from a technology-only approach to a technology and people approach, as information security becomes an expanded function of which all employees are aware of and have a responsibility to adhere to. Without clearly defined and communicated security policies on the use of new technology, organizations' exposure to risk will increase.
Comment from Jose Granado, Ernst & Young LLP's Americas practice leader for Information Security Services: The combination of more mobility, increased social access to information and outsourcing to the cloud requires a change in traditional information security paradigms. The 'outsiders are now the insiders,' meaning people and organizations outside the borders of the traditional corporate environment play a role in helping to achieve information security objectives, but can also pose a risk to protecting your information. A comprehensive IT risk management program must focus on people, processes and technology to address information throughout its life cycle, wherever it resides.
About the survey: Ernst & Young's 2010 Global Information Security Survey was conducted between June and August 2010. Nearly 1,600 organizations in 56 countries and across all major industries participated.
Contact: The full report is available here.
Despite an unproven track record, 45 percent of organizations are currently using, evaluating or planning to use cloud computing services within the next 12 months. The risks associated with cloud computing include data leakage, with 52 percent identifying it as the largest associated risk, followed by 39 percent who cite the lost visibility of company data as an increased risk of cloud-based solutions.
However, most respondents (85 percent) indicate that external certification of cloud service providers would help to evaluate security controls and increase trust.
Evidence also suggests that few organizations have fully assessed the risks associated with social networking. Just one-third report that social media presents a considerable information security challenge and only 10 percent say examining new and emerging IT trends is a very important information security function.
The focus in information security is shifting from a technology-only approach to a technology and people approach, as information security becomes an expanded function of which all employees are aware of and have a responsibility to adhere to. Without clearly defined and communicated security policies on the use of new technology, organizations' exposure to risk will increase.
Comment from Jose Granado, Ernst & Young LLP's Americas practice leader for Information Security Services: The combination of more mobility, increased social access to information and outsourcing to the cloud requires a change in traditional information security paradigms. The 'outsiders are now the insiders,' meaning people and organizations outside the borders of the traditional corporate environment play a role in helping to achieve information security objectives, but can also pose a risk to protecting your information. A comprehensive IT risk management program must focus on people, processes and technology to address information throughout its life cycle, wherever it resides.
About the survey: Ernst & Young's 2010 Global Information Security Survey was conducted between June and August 2010. Nearly 1,600 organizations in 56 countries and across all major industries participated.
Contact: The full report is available here.
Three Critical Areas For SMB Cloud Application Adoption Success
An industry researcher suggests that small and medium businesses (SMBs) prioritize planning and management of the following areas to realize benefits from cloud-based applications:
-- Organizational: Organizational issues and people continue to provide the majority of obstacles to successful SaaS implementations. Training beyond simple "how to" instruction will aid adoption.
-- Technology: In most cases SaaS solutions need to link with existing business systems. Effective management of internal IT resources and/or external implementation partners is critical.
-- Operational Skills: While the need for software development and upgrading skills will lessen, more systems integration knowledge will likely be required. Also, a shift from capital to operational expenditures when deploying SaaS applications requires financial management adjustments.
Comment from Robert McNeill, Saugatuck Technology vice president: Our 2010 survey research indicates that CRM is one of the top five cloud-based applications being adopted by SMBs today, and is expected to lead SaaS adoption and deployment for SMBs through year-end 2012.
About the publication: Sage North America says that a white paper it sponsored "Software-as-a-Service: Managing Benefits for SMBs," by Saugatuck Technology, is available here.
Contact: http://www.sagenorthamerica.com
-- Organizational: Organizational issues and people continue to provide the majority of obstacles to successful SaaS implementations. Training beyond simple "how to" instruction will aid adoption.
-- Technology: In most cases SaaS solutions need to link with existing business systems. Effective management of internal IT resources and/or external implementation partners is critical.
-- Operational Skills: While the need for software development and upgrading skills will lessen, more systems integration knowledge will likely be required. Also, a shift from capital to operational expenditures when deploying SaaS applications requires financial management adjustments.
Comment from Robert McNeill, Saugatuck Technology vice president: Our 2010 survey research indicates that CRM is one of the top five cloud-based applications being adopted by SMBs today, and is expected to lead SaaS adoption and deployment for SMBs through year-end 2012.
About the publication: Sage North America says that a white paper it sponsored "Software-as-a-Service: Managing Benefits for SMBs," by Saugatuck Technology, is available here.
Contact: http://www.sagenorthamerica.com
Cloud, SaaS Are Preferred Deployment Schemes For Project Management
According to a project management software provider, cloud and SaaS-based solutions continue to be the preferred deployment choices for project management.
The industry shift to cloud computing and IT services will continue to gain momentum in 2011.
In fact, Gartner expects large enterprises to have a dynamic sourcing team in place by 2012 responsible for ongoing cloud sourcing decisions and management. The benefits of "cloud economics," which include large upfront capital expenses being exchanged for lower regular operational expenses and simpler accountability for services delivered, will drive cloud adoption as CIOs and IT leaders try to deliver the most value from constrained budgets.
Comment from Ian Knox, vice president of marketing at Daptiv: Project management has traditionally resided in the IT department of the enterprise but as PPM becomes more strategic, it is emerging as a critical business discipline for prioritizing projects, budgets and resources. Given tepid IT spending projections for the coming year, managers and executives -- as well as IT personnel -- will need greater visibility into project, program and portfolio execution, as well as the ability to measure progress against key business priorities.
About the predictions: Daptiv's predictions for project portfolio management in 2011 are based on emerging industry trends and feedback from Daptiv's more than 500 enterprise customers. A key prediction: Project Management Offices (PMOs) will expand beyond the traditional IT realm and play an increasingly larger role in strategic planning and business execution, especially given anticipated budget and resource restrictions in the year ahead.
Contact: http://www.daptiv.com/
The industry shift to cloud computing and IT services will continue to gain momentum in 2011.
In fact, Gartner expects large enterprises to have a dynamic sourcing team in place by 2012 responsible for ongoing cloud sourcing decisions and management. The benefits of "cloud economics," which include large upfront capital expenses being exchanged for lower regular operational expenses and simpler accountability for services delivered, will drive cloud adoption as CIOs and IT leaders try to deliver the most value from constrained budgets.
Comment from Ian Knox, vice president of marketing at Daptiv: Project management has traditionally resided in the IT department of the enterprise but as PPM becomes more strategic, it is emerging as a critical business discipline for prioritizing projects, budgets and resources. Given tepid IT spending projections for the coming year, managers and executives -- as well as IT personnel -- will need greater visibility into project, program and portfolio execution, as well as the ability to measure progress against key business priorities.
About the predictions: Daptiv's predictions for project portfolio management in 2011 are based on emerging industry trends and feedback from Daptiv's more than 500 enterprise customers. A key prediction: Project Management Offices (PMOs) will expand beyond the traditional IT realm and play an increasingly larger role in strategic planning and business execution, especially given anticipated budget and resource restrictions in the year ahead.
Contact: http://www.daptiv.com/
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Companies Are Not Prepared To Address Risks Created By Cloud Computing, Other New Technologies
Less than a third of global businesses have an IT risk management program capable of addressing the risks related to the use of new technologies like cloud computing, according to a survey.
In spite of the rapid emergence of new technology, just one in ten companies consider examining new and emerging IT trends a very important activity for the information security function to perform.
A significant increase in use of external service providers and business adoption of new technologies, such as cloud computing, social networking and Web 2.0, is recognized to increase risk for 60 percent of respondents. Yet, in spite of this, less than half intend to increase annual investment in information security.
Over half of respondents state that increased workforce mobility poses a considerable challenge to the effective delivery of information security initiatives, due to widespread use of mobile computing devices. For almost two-thirds employees' level of security awareness is recognized as a considerable challenge.
Half of respondents plan to spend more over the next year on data leakage and data loss prevention -- up 7 percent from last year. To address potential new risks, 39 percent are making policy adjustments, 29 percent are implementing encryption techniques and 28 percent are implementing stronger identity and access management controls. For the first time, continuous availability of critical IT resources was identified as one of the top five risks. 23 percent of respondents are using cloud computing services, a further 15 percent plan to use within the next 12 months. For 85 percent of respondents, external certification of cloud service providers would increase trust; 43 percent state that certification should be based upon an agreed standard and 22 percent require accreditation for the certifying body.
Comment from Paul van Kessel, Ernst & Young Global IT Risk and Assurance Leader: Technology advances provide an increasingly mobile workforce with seemingly endless ways to connect and interact with colleagues, customers and clients. These advances represent a massive opportunity for IT to deliver significant benefits to the organization but new technology also means new risk. It is vital that companies not only recognize this risk, but take action to avoid it. As the mobile workforce continues to grow, so does the level of risk. In addition to implementing new technology solutions and re-engineering information flows, companies must focus on informing the workforce about risks. The delivery of effective, and regular, security awareness training is a critical success factor as companies attempt to keep pace with the changing environment.
About the survey: Ernst & Young's 2010 Global Information Security Survey was conducted between June and August 2010. Nearly 1,600 organizations in 56 countries and across all major industries participated.
Contact: http://www.ey.com
In spite of the rapid emergence of new technology, just one in ten companies consider examining new and emerging IT trends a very important activity for the information security function to perform.
A significant increase in use of external service providers and business adoption of new technologies, such as cloud computing, social networking and Web 2.0, is recognized to increase risk for 60 percent of respondents. Yet, in spite of this, less than half intend to increase annual investment in information security.
Over half of respondents state that increased workforce mobility poses a considerable challenge to the effective delivery of information security initiatives, due to widespread use of mobile computing devices. For almost two-thirds employees' level of security awareness is recognized as a considerable challenge.
Half of respondents plan to spend more over the next year on data leakage and data loss prevention -- up 7 percent from last year. To address potential new risks, 39 percent are making policy adjustments, 29 percent are implementing encryption techniques and 28 percent are implementing stronger identity and access management controls. For the first time, continuous availability of critical IT resources was identified as one of the top five risks. 23 percent of respondents are using cloud computing services, a further 15 percent plan to use within the next 12 months. For 85 percent of respondents, external certification of cloud service providers would increase trust; 43 percent state that certification should be based upon an agreed standard and 22 percent require accreditation for the certifying body.
Comment from Paul van Kessel, Ernst & Young Global IT Risk and Assurance Leader: Technology advances provide an increasingly mobile workforce with seemingly endless ways to connect and interact with colleagues, customers and clients. These advances represent a massive opportunity for IT to deliver significant benefits to the organization but new technology also means new risk. It is vital that companies not only recognize this risk, but take action to avoid it. As the mobile workforce continues to grow, so does the level of risk. In addition to implementing new technology solutions and re-engineering information flows, companies must focus on informing the workforce about risks. The delivery of effective, and regular, security awareness training is a critical success factor as companies attempt to keep pace with the changing environment.
About the survey: Ernst & Young's 2010 Global Information Security Survey was conducted between June and August 2010. Nearly 1,600 organizations in 56 countries and across all major industries participated.
Contact: http://www.ey.com
As Cloud Technology Moves From Hype to Reality, Management Challenges Loom
Whether it is private or public, Software as a Service (SaaS) or Platform as a Service (PaaS), an extension of the data center or just virtualization, conversations about the "cloud" are occurring in organizations of all sizes, a survey has found.
While IT professionals understand the need for and benefits of moving to the cloud, many continue to struggle with the challenges of managing this next big wave of computing.
Survey findings:
-- More than 60 percent of the respondents indicated their organizations are either evaluating cloud computing or already investing in the technology.
-- Respondents understood the benefits of a cloud-based approach, citing operational efficiency (28 percent), business flexibility (24 percent) and financial savings (19 percent) as the top three reasons for adopting cloud services.
-- The top cloud services that respondents were evaluating are Software-as-a-Service (40 percent) and Platform-as-a-Service (15 percent).
IT teams are the driving force behind the move to the cloud, but the responses showed that all the hype about the cloud is not outweighing pragmatism.
-- Nearly 40 percent are OK with a "slow but steady" approach to cloud computing.
-- Respondents were asked "When is your target time frame to begin implementation?" and (28 percent) responded that there was, "No target time set," although 16 percent of those respondents are on track to begin within the next six months.
The need to acquire more skills and knowledge was another key theme of respondents. Among the findings in this area:
-- Among their list of top concerns: Security (cited by 73 percent); ability to resolve application issues (55 percent); being blamed when service is down or slow (42 percent).
-- 77 percent feel they either lack the proper training or expect to have to augment their skills and expertise to become proficient in the cloud and to manage the implementation.
-- Nearly one-third perceive that a move to the public cloud creates an increase in their responsibilities and opportunities.
While respondents generally recognize the value of cloud services for the efficiency, flexibility and financial benefits noted above, their concerns indicate that effectively monitoring the availability and performance of the workloads moved to public, private and hybrid cloud environments is critical.
-- With respect to public cloud deployments, it is important for IT organizations to not only have visibility into availability and performance of these workloads, but also similar visibility into the network and infrastructure that connects end-users to these public cloud services. IT teams must ensure that the latency, bandwidth, and traffic prioritization of their networks are proactively managed to ensure responsiveness of services.
-- For IT shops building private cloud services, effective monitoring and management systems are critical to delivering the "on demand" model that end-users expect -- reliability is a critical expectation that can't be overlooked.
Comment from Suku Krishnaraj, Senior Vice President, Product Strategy for SolarWinds: As a company, we make it a priority to stay on top of the challenges that our customers face on a daily basis. More and more, we are hearing about how cloud -- and related trends such as data center consolidation, virtualization and SaaS -- is driving IT organizations to re-think their IT management needs and priorities. In the past, management of the IT environment was often an afterthought. But, this survey indicates that more and more IT organizations are thinking about the need to manage the performance and availability of these cloud-based services as a part of their planning process. As a provider of (private) cloud services, IT orgs need to ensure not just the availability of the compute infrastructure or silo applications, but also optimal performance across the whole IT stack, including application, compute, storage and network.
About the survey: SolarWinds conducted the survey in the fall of 2010 and received responses from nearly 100 IT professionals. The IT professionals were either customers or prospective customers of SolarWinds. As part of the survey, SolarWinds asked each IT professional a series of questions related to their organizations' plans to use cloud computing in their IT environment, the decision drivers for those plans, and the expected impacts of cloud deployments on their IT teams.
Contact: http://www.solarwinds.com
While IT professionals understand the need for and benefits of moving to the cloud, many continue to struggle with the challenges of managing this next big wave of computing.
Survey findings:
-- More than 60 percent of the respondents indicated their organizations are either evaluating cloud computing or already investing in the technology.
-- Respondents understood the benefits of a cloud-based approach, citing operational efficiency (28 percent), business flexibility (24 percent) and financial savings (19 percent) as the top three reasons for adopting cloud services.
-- The top cloud services that respondents were evaluating are Software-as-a-Service (40 percent) and Platform-as-a-Service (15 percent).
IT teams are the driving force behind the move to the cloud, but the responses showed that all the hype about the cloud is not outweighing pragmatism.
-- Nearly 40 percent are OK with a "slow but steady" approach to cloud computing.
-- Respondents were asked "When is your target time frame to begin implementation?" and (28 percent) responded that there was, "No target time set," although 16 percent of those respondents are on track to begin within the next six months.
The need to acquire more skills and knowledge was another key theme of respondents. Among the findings in this area:
-- Among their list of top concerns: Security (cited by 73 percent); ability to resolve application issues (55 percent); being blamed when service is down or slow (42 percent).
-- 77 percent feel they either lack the proper training or expect to have to augment their skills and expertise to become proficient in the cloud and to manage the implementation.
-- Nearly one-third perceive that a move to the public cloud creates an increase in their responsibilities and opportunities.
While respondents generally recognize the value of cloud services for the efficiency, flexibility and financial benefits noted above, their concerns indicate that effectively monitoring the availability and performance of the workloads moved to public, private and hybrid cloud environments is critical.
-- With respect to public cloud deployments, it is important for IT organizations to not only have visibility into availability and performance of these workloads, but also similar visibility into the network and infrastructure that connects end-users to these public cloud services. IT teams must ensure that the latency, bandwidth, and traffic prioritization of their networks are proactively managed to ensure responsiveness of services.
-- For IT shops building private cloud services, effective monitoring and management systems are critical to delivering the "on demand" model that end-users expect -- reliability is a critical expectation that can't be overlooked.
Comment from Suku Krishnaraj, Senior Vice President, Product Strategy for SolarWinds: As a company, we make it a priority to stay on top of the challenges that our customers face on a daily basis. More and more, we are hearing about how cloud -- and related trends such as data center consolidation, virtualization and SaaS -- is driving IT organizations to re-think their IT management needs and priorities. In the past, management of the IT environment was often an afterthought. But, this survey indicates that more and more IT organizations are thinking about the need to manage the performance and availability of these cloud-based services as a part of their planning process. As a provider of (private) cloud services, IT orgs need to ensure not just the availability of the compute infrastructure or silo applications, but also optimal performance across the whole IT stack, including application, compute, storage and network.
About the survey: SolarWinds conducted the survey in the fall of 2010 and received responses from nearly 100 IT professionals. The IT professionals were either customers or prospective customers of SolarWinds. As part of the survey, SolarWinds asked each IT professional a series of questions related to their organizations' plans to use cloud computing in their IT environment, the decision drivers for those plans, and the expected impacts of cloud deployments on their IT teams.
Contact: http://www.solarwinds.com
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Smarter, Business Policy-Driven Automation is Needed to Fuel Cloud Computing
A profile of U.S. and U.K. cloud adopters reinforces the idea that automation is a key enabler of cloud computing and that a lack of smart, business policy-driven automation may inhibit success with cloud computing.
Although 93 percent of organizations surveyed were interested in one or more types of automation, 65 percent had no automation for their private clouds and 28 percent had only basic automation. Only seven percent could seamlessly move workloads using automation.
Preference for private clouds (45 percent) followed by hybrid clouds (21 percent) 93 percent interested in some form of cloud automation 65 percent have no automation for their private clouds 28 percent have basic automation (automated provisioning of VMs) for their private clouds 40 percent interested in smarter, business-driven automation (policy engines and the decision triggers of automation). Only seven percent have advanced automation including the ability to seamlessly move workloads using smart automation
Comment from the study by Forrester Consulting (sponsored by Abiquo): As enterprises build private clouds, the need for smarter, more business-oriented automation is becoming clear. Our profile revealed varying degrees of automation maturity, which threaten to inhibit many from attaining the desired outcomes of business flexibility and low operational cost. Those with limited automation must evolve beyond their automated provisioning and migration to attain true cloud computing. Their developmental and operational processes must be strong and additional automation technologies that analyze behaviors and also business and regulatory policies will be necessary in order to adapt when deviations are detected.
Contact: http://www.abiquo.com
Although 93 percent of organizations surveyed were interested in one or more types of automation, 65 percent had no automation for their private clouds and 28 percent had only basic automation. Only seven percent could seamlessly move workloads using automation.
Preference for private clouds (45 percent) followed by hybrid clouds (21 percent) 93 percent interested in some form of cloud automation 65 percent have no automation for their private clouds 28 percent have basic automation (automated provisioning of VMs) for their private clouds 40 percent interested in smarter, business-driven automation (policy engines and the decision triggers of automation). Only seven percent have advanced automation including the ability to seamlessly move workloads using smart automation
Comment from the study by Forrester Consulting (sponsored by Abiquo): As enterprises build private clouds, the need for smarter, more business-oriented automation is becoming clear. Our profile revealed varying degrees of automation maturity, which threaten to inhibit many from attaining the desired outcomes of business flexibility and low operational cost. Those with limited automation must evolve beyond their automated provisioning and migration to attain true cloud computing. Their developmental and operational processes must be strong and additional automation technologies that analyze behaviors and also business and regulatory policies will be necessary in order to adapt when deviations are detected.
Contact: http://www.abiquo.com
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