Cloud Solutions Propelled Into The Spotlight Courtesy Of Covid-19

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, cloud service solutions have been thrown into the limelight as companies and organisations across the globe grapple with the rapid shift to remote working and learning. With the widespread closure of non-essential organisations and businesses forcing organisations’ leaders to consider new and innovative approaches to shifting their businesses online, the move to cloud computing has become a far greater priority than ever before. The industry statistics demonstrate this: according to new figures from analyst firm Gartner, by the end of 2020 we will have seen the global public cloud services market reach $266.4 billion, up from $227.8 billion in 2019.

Prior to now, a lack of urgency and insufficient knowledge about cloud computing has been “holding Australian businesses back”, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Its 2018-2019 Business Characteristics Survey found that 17 percent of businesses said the biggest limitation to their adoption of cloud technologies was insufficient knowledge, and that 78 percent of “innovative businesses” said the cloud was at least of some importance to their digital technologies, compared to 53 percent of “non-innovative businesses”.

“Until recently, data security and regulatory compliance has been a key concern that has held enterprises back from moving to the cloud,”

said Javed Ali, co-founder of Intergrid, a data centre and cloud infrastructure provider operating in seven locations across Australia and New Zealand.

“In Australia, there is a range of state and federal legislation that restricts how personal and confidential data can be stored in the cloud. Few realise that there are companies such as Intergrid that are specialists in managing cloud transformation for businesses in these highly regulated industries, and so they are obviously reluctant to make the move.”

Intergrid is an innovative cloud service and server hosting provider that helps local and international clients navigate the increasingly complex regulatory requirements surrounding data management. Its services include blending cloud technology with regulatory consultancy to advise highly regulated industries, such as healthcare and education, on their obligations in Australia’s regulatory environment.

“We understand how complex and burdensome the data management environment has become for SMEs and corporates. We work to find cost-effective solutions for those organisations that guaranteed data sovereignty and fulfil legal compliance requirements,” Javed added.

“We have the unique ability to provide cloud services that are physically located in every Australian state and territory, ensuring that businesses can comply with legislative requirements that require data to be stored locally within the jurisdiction.” 

Australia isn’t the only country where organisations remain uncertain of the legal implications of potentially exposing confidential data by shifting it to the cloud. With several recent instances of data security breaches in major technology companies attaining notoriety, businesses across the globe have become incredibly serious about data privacy and security in 2020.

Fortunately, many have enhanced their protection as a result: 68 percent of companies say they have invested in specialist security technology and consulting services to help protect against this risk.

But despite these preventative measures, the number of organisations that have suffered a data breach that involved the loss or theft of 1,000 or more records has grown: in 2019, 63 percent of organisations reported a breach, up from 56 percent just two years ago.

“What’s incredibly important in this day and age is for IT executives to not sacrifice on their due diligence in the interests of expediency. Even if organisations are rapidly shifting their operations online, take the time to find a cloud service provider that can give your business assurances of where your data is stored, has expertise in your industry’s compliance obligations and that has robust cybersecurity measures,” Javed said.

“At Intergrid, for example, we’ve made substantial investments in cybersecurity to protect customers and their users from inbound denial of service (DDoS) attacks. We have the capacity to detect, mitigate and protect against attacks within our Australian and New Zealand network, without impacting performance or sending network traffic offshore.”

In terms of data management as an industry itself, we are also seeing significant and unprecedented growth - for reasons not related to COVID. Between 2020 to 2025, the global enterprise data management market size is expected to grow from USD 77.9 billion to USD 122.9 billion, at a CAGR of 9.5 percent.

Key drivers of this growth include organisations wanting to improve their customer experience, make faster business decisions based on analytical insights, and accelerate transactional operations. 

Companies dedicated to enabling this increasingly sophisticated and competitive cloud managed service landscape are set to thrive in the coming years, according to industry data. And it’s no wonder: the cloud computing market is an incredibly lucrative one for cloud computing service providers, as companies from diverse vertical markets are increasingly adopting cloud computing services.

“The cloud ecosystem in coming years will comprise of cloud-native business operations, multi-cloud and hybrid cloud strategies, and edge computing for content distribution. Cloud adoption will also increase; recent estimates show that by 2022 roughly two-thirds of organisations will use an external cloud service provider, which is double the amount that used one in 2018,” Javed added. 

While the coronavirus pandemic has certainly been fuelling cloud computing spending, with leading providers offering their technologies to help governments and researchers find ways of combating the virus, cloud computing would likely be on its way anyway. COVID-19 has simply fast tracked its journey to the main stage.