If you still think the top reason enterprises are testing and implementing cloud computing is to cut costs, you’d be right. But enterprises are increasingly citing myriad other reasons, reasons that will deliver much more value than that. In fact, just behind savings in top reasons for cloud is mobility, according to a new KPMG study.
The professional services company’s 2014 Cloud Survey report is based on web-based surveys of more than 500 global business executives, including CEOs, CIOs and CFOs—from organizations with annual revenues between $100 million and $20+ billion and spanning more than a dozen major industries. According to KPMG, the executives’ responses indicate much greater cloud usage than what the 2012 survey revealed. And the drivers are far more varied and pivotal to business transformation.
KPMG’s survey found that the top use of cloud is driving cost efficiencies (49 percent). But there are plenty of other reasons to use cloud that are gathering steam. For example, 42 percent of respondents said they are using cloud to better enable a flexible and mobile workforce. Not too far behind, 37 percent said their use of cloud is about improving alignment and interaction with customers, suppliers and business partners and 35 percent said they use cloud to better leverage data so they can make better business decisions.
We’ve heard these reasons, for sure. But what is striking, as KPMG points out, is how different the importance of these reasons looks. In 2012, cost efficiencies took the top spot at 48 percent. But the next reason (which by the way was speed to adoption) was a far second at 28 percent. Such a large gap, KPMG said in its report, illustrates how much more powerful a driver cost was in 2012 than it is today.
I think this quote from Rick Wright, Principal and Global Cloud Enablement Leader at KPMG, in the KPMG report sums up the point best:
“It’s clear now that while organizations may have come to the cloud to reduce costs, it’s not why they stay. The true potential of cloud lies in an organization’s ability to leverage this agile delivery model to transform the business.”
I’ll share more interesting tidbits from the KPMG report in a subsequent post. In the meantime, let us know what you think about these findings in our comments section below.