Survey Finds Cloud Computing is Hot

In a survey conducted at Cisco's conference, Cisco Live, by Network Instruments, 71 percent of organizations say they've "implemented some form of cloud computing" though the term isn't clearly defined. The survey asked 184 network engineers, managers, and directors about their cloud environment and plans.

Of that 71 percent, half have set up a private cloud. Anything "as a service" is popular, too. Network Instruments reports that 46 percent of respondents have implemented a SaaS application, 32 percent report using an Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) solution such as Amazon's EC2 (Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud), and 16 percent use a Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) technology, such as Microsoft Azure and SalesForce.com’s Force.

What is cloud computing? Network Instruments says the majority (46 percent) think it means "IT services accessed via public Internet," and just over a third (34 percent) think it refers to "computer resources and storage that can be accessed on-demand."

Of those using cloud computing (however it's defined), 64 percent said application availability improved, and just under half (48 percent) said they were able to reduce the costs of managing their IT infrastructure. That's the good news. The downside: 64 percent said network performance remained steady or declined. Also lower: 65 percent said corporate data security remained the same or dropped; 35 percent said security improved.

“With proper planning and tools to ensure visibility from the user to the cloud provider, Cisco Live attendees are successfully deploying cloud services,” said Brad Reinboldt, product marketing manager at Network Instruments, in a statement. “I was a bit surprised by the number of companies lacking tools to detect and troubleshoot cloud performance issues, as they risk running into significant problems that jeopardize any cost savings they may have initially gained.”

-- James E. Powell
Editorial Director, ESJ

Posted by Jim Powell on 06/30/2010