INTELLIGENT BRANDS // Cloud
The role of the cloud in your
digital transformation journey
B
usinesses acknowledge they
are buried under mountains
of inefficiencies and missed
opportunities. CEOs understand that
digital is either an opportunity or a
threat. So, the question is not about
awareness, but how to unleash the power
of digital transformation while finding a
balance between maintaining a healthy
business and current infrastructure, and
innovating without disruption.
The mandate from business to IT has
shifted. For decades, a CIO’s chief
responsibility was to reduce costs and
keep the lights on just enough to run
mission-critical processes. Now, CIOs and
IT departments are tasked with driving
business innovation. To stay competitive
in a digital economy, it is no longer
sufficient to have a system landscape
whose primary role is to keep records.
Most organisations invest a great
deal to maintain and customise their
IT landscapes to meet their unique
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business needs. Today, nearly every
organisation has some level of cloud
presence, typically for customer
relationship management (CRM),
human capital management (HCM),
or procurement. The question we
hear most often from customers is
not how to make their first foray into
the cloud, but rather how to design a
comprehensive enterprise cloud strategy
that: protects existing investments,
accelerates innovation and keeps
an organisation’s unique business
processes intact.
Moving to the cloud does not mean
breaking off some parts of the business
in a piecemeal fashion or taking a rip-
and-replace approach.
Cloud is one of the key drivers of digital
transformation. Cloud has disrupted
the traditional IT model by drastically
reducing time to market and TCO for
innovative solutions. With its ease of
use and ubiquitous access, cloud has
democratised the decisions about
software purchasing, access, and usage.
Cloud computing offers immense
opportunity for companies to improve
their business operations, regardless of
sector. Modern cloud offerings reduce
IT infrastructure complexity and
free up resources that can be better
applied to driving innovation. And with
security topping the list of concerns
among business and IT leaders, cloud
providers today invest talent and
energy into ensuring their offerings are
able to meet even the most stringent
security requirements.
According to IDC, cloud spending is
expected to surge by 25% to reach
more than $100bn, with cloud data
centres expected to double in number.
In a separate study, analysts found
that an astonishing $237bn in profits
were lost by the top 200 global
companies alone, mainly due to the
hidden costs of complexity.
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