80% of enterprises to be equipped for cloud move by 2021: IDC, Micro Focus

At 80%, most enterprises are expected to have a mechanism in place to shift to a cloud centric infrastructure by 2021-end, a research report showed.

The list of predictions, as part of the FutureSpace report published by US marketing intelligence firm IDC and UK software company Micro Focus, was focused on cloud growth, digital resilience and technical debt.

Even as enterprises ramp up investments in hybrid cloud amid the pandemic, 70% of all CIOs will have to cope with financial stress due to technical debt accumulated during the pandemic, the report said. Reactions to the changed workforce and operations would count for 80% of edge-driven investments by 2023, it said.

“The pandemic made enterprises answer some tough questions. For instance, were they ready for hyperconnectivity? Could their employees access critical data, remotely and securely?” Saurabh Saxena, managing director of Micro Focus India, said.

Micro Focus and IDC also predicted that by 2023, there would be new cloud ecosystems that would extend resource control and provide real time analytics for all IT and automation initiatives. By the same year, more than 80% of enterprises would overhaul their relationships with suppliers and partners to allow for better execution of digital strategies.

Read: Google Cloud partners in India to register multifold growth by 2025: IDC  

Cautioning companies on underinvesting in IT, the report said that the hybrid workforce and automation efforts of half of enterprises would be delayed or downright fail due to underinvestment in building IT, security and DevOps teams with the right skill sets and tools.  

Referring to predictive trends in the Forbes Global 2000 list of companies, the report said that 75% of companies would provide the same technical requirements to a hybrid workforce, enabling them to work together more efficiently.

In terms of following ecofriendly methods of working, 90% of G2000 companies would mandate the use of reusable materials in their IT hardware supply chains for better carbon norms and lower energy usage, it said.

About 65% of global APAC GDP is expected to be digitalized by 2022, which translates to $6.8 trillion IT spending between 2020 and 2023, the report said.