A new survey shows that the maturity of cloud-based solutions has increased significantly in the Nordic region over the past five years, both from a strategic and operational perspective – with Sweden battling it out with Finland for first place.
The survey, called Cloud Maturity Index 2019, was conducted by IT supplier Tieto and is based on responses from over 300 Nordic IT decision-makers in both the private and public sectors. It shows that almost one in five organisations (18 per cent) in the Nordic region can now be considered ‘mature’ in their relationship with cloud services. A further 27 per cent were seen as ‘knowledgeable’, while 42 per cent are at a basic level and 13 per cent are considered ‘immature’. Being classified as a mature cloud business means that the cloud has achieved approximately 20 per cent lower IT operating costs and an average of 15 per cent increased efficiency – and thus increased competitiveness.
What is significant for organisations considered mature is that they make extensive and frequent use of cloud services and cloud platforms – as much as 97 per cent of their IT is cloud-based, and they are generally much better at exploiting the advantages of the cloud compared with more immature organisations.
Public sector immature buyers of cloud services
In terms of specific industries, the financial industry ranks highest among Nordic organisations, which was also the case when the same survey was conducted in 2015 and 2017. Unfortunately, the public sector continues to have the lowest strategic and operational maturity. Manufacturing is the industry where maturity has grown the fastest compared to previous years' measurements.
The report also highlights the importance of considering environmental factors in an organisation's cloud initiatives. Just over half of the companies surveyed stated that they already considered issues such as energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions as part of their cloud strategy. Unsurprisingly, mature organisations are also at the forefront here and have a better understanding of why environmental initiatives linked to IT and the cloud are important.
When it comes to data sovereignty, Tieto points to Finland as a pioneer that stands out thanks to its advanced cloud security – not least because it is at the forefront of the public sector in the Nordic region. In Sweden, according to Tieto, data sovereignty is a ‘fairly polarised’ area.
Generally increased confidence in cloud solutions
Another survey, from Barracuda Networks, shows that organisations around the world are increasingly relying on the public cloud. The survey asked over 850 IT security managers from around the world. Their responses show a sharp increase in confidence in public cloud installations. Over two-fifths (44 per cent) now believe that public cloud environments are ‘as secure’ as local IT environments, while 21 per cent claim that they are ‘even more secure’. In addition, 60 per cent say they are “quite” or ‘very’ confident that their organisation's use of cloud technology is secure.
It is entirely logical that confidence is growing as more and more people learn about – and fully understand – how cloud technology works and what cloud providers do to protect their customers' data. After all, cloud providers can use significantly more modern and secure infrastructure than most individual organisations can afford (or have the expertise to procure correctly).
In the cloud, however, organisations can benefit from customised and maximally secure equipment, infrastructure and security procedures – cloud providers simply cannot afford to compromise in these areas for competitive reasons. As long as organisations choose the right partners and security tools and fully understand what shared responsibility in the cloud entails, the security risks surrounding their data can be significantly reduced. Not least because the cloud often offers more options for backup and much higher redundancy to further minimise risks.
Some hesitation regarding sensitive data in the cloud
However, even though confidence is growing, there are still some concerns that are slowing down organisations' adoption of the cloud. The organisations in Barracuda Networks' survey are hesitant to put certain types of sensitive data in the cloud. 53 per cent believe that customer information is the most questionable to put in the cloud, while 55 per cent believe that internal financial data is the most sensitive.
In other words, there is clear potential for improvement for cloud providers, who need to become better at clearly demonstrating how security works and why the cloud is a more secure alternative than, for example, purely on-premise solutions. This is particularly important given that 47 per cent of respondents in the survey complain about shortcomings in cyber security and 42 per cent believe that there are shortcomings in the transparency of cloud services, which can make it difficult for organisations to work with cloud security.
