The Cloud Computing Game Is Still Wide Open
Customers Lean Toward VMware
VMware’s dominance of the local data center extends to the cloud: 74% of survey respondents expressed a strong preference for a VMware-based cloud.
Keeping Cloud Options Open
Customers plan to expand the number of cloud service providers they do business with: 60% indicate an interest in adding cloud vendors, and 25% plan to switch vendors. But less than 20% plan to eliminate cloud providers at this point.
Rates of Cloud Success
VMware leads, but Microsoft Azure is not far behind. VMware vCloud-based service providers report the highest success (67%) and lowest failure rates (33%)—defined as stalled or unsuccessful (tried but failed) adoption. In terms of success, Microsoft Azure came in at 56%, Amazon Web Services at 43% and Rackspace at 37%.
Top Cloud Computing Challenges
It seems like customers are having a little trouble with everything. The top cloud computing challenges are pricing and performance, which are tied at 38%. Other challenges include support (36%), downtime (35%), management (33%) and scalability (33%).
Cloud Capabilities in Need of Improvement
Much work still needs to be done. Better management dashboards top list at 52%, followed by easier resource scalability (46%), better VMware vSphere integration (45%) and more transparent pricing (43%).
Top Reasons to Move to the Cloud
Agility is finally on a par with cost. Faster deployment of new workloads leads, with 48%, followed by faster scaling of existing workloads, at 47%, and reduced capital and operating expenses, at 47%.
Critical Cloud Advantages
Disaster recovery becomes a byproduct of the cloud. Disaster recovery topped list of cloud advantages, at 49%; followed by cost and rapid scalability, both at 48%; and deployment speed, at 45%.
Cloud Governance Matters
The Asia-Pacific region (100%); United States (97%); and Europe, Middle East and Africa (96%) said that the ability to target workloads toward data centers in specific regions to ensure compliance and data sovereignty is important or very important.
Professional Services Required
A full 80% required some professional services to get started. Areas needing professional services include security and compliance services, at 57%, followed by integration with the local data center (47%), disaster recovery (45%), ongoing management (40%) and general planning (40%).