A quarter of companies use cloud storage

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Proact Storage Barometer:

More than a quarter – 26 per cent – of listed companies and authorities use cloud services for storage and archiving, or are planning to do so. However, many IT departments are still playing a waiting game when it comes to IT in the clouds. These are the findings of the Proact Storage Barometer.  

“However, developments are taking place quickly, and I think we will be seeing a breakthrough soon,” says Per Sedihn, CTO at Proact. Forma Publishing Group is one company that perceives clear gains from buying cloud storage.  

“Companies are still uncertain as to what cloud services are all about and what the benefits are, but this is always what happens when new technologies and models are established. Using cloud storage can reduce costs significantly, and now most suppliers of products and services in the field are working on developing their ranges,” says Per Sedihn. 

The Storage Barometer is based on interview responses from IT managers at 100 listed companies and authorities, who indicated what their views are of cloud computing in the field of storage and archiving. 14 per cent are currently using services, while a further 12 per cent are planning to do so. 60 per cent state that cloud services are not relevant to their business just at the moment; this may be due to the fact that they have just made major investments in hardware and software. 

Listed companies have made slightly more progress in this field; a total of 36 per cent are using cloud services, or planning to do so. The corresponding figure for the public sector is just 16 per cent.

The main advantages of cloud services, according to respondents, are that they enhance flexibility, reduce costs and cut back on administration. The biggest obstacle is posed by the fear of placing business data outside the company.

Forma Publishing Group, one of the biggest publishing houses in Sweden, has opted to buy its storage as a cloud service. This is bringing about major savings; for instance, the company does not have to invest time and resources in upgrading systems and buying in disk space. 

 “We have been able to reduce our costs massively. Not least, we are avoiding costly overdimensioning of our systems, an issue which is pretty unavoidable when you own your own hardware. We only pay for the storage capacity we use, in gigabytes a month,” says Anneli Angeling, CIO at Forma Publishing Group. 

* The Storage Barometer was carried out in the first quarter of 2010 through telephone interviews with 100 randomly selected authorities and listed companies in Sweden. The questions were put to heads of IT/IT managers. One-third of the organisations in the survey have 500 employees or more.

For more information:

Per Sedihn, CTO, Proact, tel.: +46 (52) 8 410 666 00, e-mail: per.sedihn@proact.se  

Anneli Angeling, CIO, Forma Publishing Group, tel.: +46 (0) 21 475 76 12, e-mail:
anneli.angeling@formapg.se

About Proact Proact is a specialist in storage, archiving and securing large volumes of mission-critical information. As an independent integrator, Proact provides systems, support and consulting services within our focus area of data storage and archiving. The Proact Group has more than 300 employees and conducts business in Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, The Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. Proact was founded in 1994 and its parent company, Proact IT Group AB (publ) has been listed on Nasdaq OMX Stockholm since 1999 under the symbol PACT. Additional information about Proact is available at www.proact.eu.