Navint: CIOs enthusiastic over virtual private cloud adoption

by Xtium Research

Consulting firm Navint recently released a study that revealed widespread satisfaction among C-level executives who have moved to a virtual private cloud environment. The constantly improving technology involved with the infrastructure also translated into more direct cost savings, the report stated, with 90 percent of respondents claiming they received all the financial benefits promised, and sometimes more.

Furthermore, two-thirds of decision makers have noticed a significant impact on worker efficiency and effectiveness, demonstrating how the secondary effects of the cloud are becoming more well known and doing more to sway executives away from legacy systems.

Security is still a frontline concern for CIOs and IT departments, but an interesting finding from the survey is that the virtual private cloud is appealing to executives as a way to beef up internal security instead of minimize it.

The changing landscape
SeekingAlpha recently stated that one of the lures of managed cloud hosting – enacting a virtual private cloud through a third party – is that it encompasses efficiency and security desires. A cloud vendor is able to provide greater access to security because it deals in high end hardware and software.

While internal practices still need to be updated, including improved event monitoring and employee password generation, implementing a network through a third party that is up to date means a lesser chance of a security breach, according to the news source.

This is good news for cloud vendors that have typically been inhibited from achieving high adoption rates because of security. Decision makers who were typically hesitant to use the cloud because they viewed it as unsafe are seeing its direct impact and are investigating the technology more thoroughly. There is also more testing of the cloud waters, with businesses implementing single SaaS applications or making a gradual changeover from their current infrastructure.

Navint's study concluded that virtual private cloud spending will continue to rise as employers become more aware of its benefits. While the result may not be groundbreaking – after all, IDC and Gartner have both predicted strong growth in the cloud sector – it has also predicted a decrease in the amount of executives having an inexplicable fear of the cloud.

Many of the things that were holding implementation rates down were largely unfounded or muddled. Executives were considering only single instances of the cloud being a problem as indicative of the technology overall. Instead, decision makers are realizing that the cloud is an emerging tool with which business can be improved, and that security can be effectively overseen and augmented in the cloud.