Organisations Still Planning to Increase Multi-Cloud Usage

As organisations faced new challenges in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic – from increased levels of remote work and collaboration with new business partners and suppliers – they adopted multi-cloud strategies to gain the flexibility and scalability they needed.

With the ‘one-stop-shop’ mentality having died when it comes to the cloud, enterprises are choosing a multi-cloud model for the benefits it provides, for a range of different business and operational requirements

Research from OVHcloud – Europe’s largest cloud provider – has identified that around two-thirds (62%) of organisations today are currently using multiple clouds, with a further 18% actively in the process of transitioning to a multi-cloud environment.

According to Matt Tebay, Sales Director at OVHcloud, using the right cloud for the right workload is rapidly being accepted as the best way to do business today. 

“Almost two thirds (64%) of organisations see their use of multi-cloud increasing in the next two years, so although it can bring considerable complexity, the benefits are clear to companies today,” he says. “In fact, only 3% of organisations said that their use of multi-cloud would decrease in the next two years, and fewer than 1% have no plans to use multi-cloud at all.”

Flexibility, improved agility and operational gains: The benefits of multi-cloud

The flexibility of multi-cloud, allowing organisations to run workloads in the right cloud environments, was recognised by half of OVHcloud’s study as one of its main strengths, closely followed by improved agility (41%). Cost-effectiveness and gaining access to better infrastructure on an OpEx basis (40%) as well as reduced organisational risk (39%) – through having fewer points of failure – were also seen as key advantages. 

“Running the right application on the right cloud can bring significant operational gains to organisations,” continued Tebay. “Although working in multiple cloud environments can require higher levels of skills and training, when done well it can bring both enhanced agility and a solid commercial ROI.”  

Multi-cloud still presents challenges

But despite the recent rise in multi-cloud adoption, a number of challenges remain, with cloud proliferation leading to organisations facing significant operational challenges when it comes to extracting insights from data.

According to OVHcloud’s report, 27% of IT decision-makers highlight technical complexity as one of their main concern or area of risk, and 31% being concerned with a larger physical estate implying more endpoints to secure, and as a result, more possible vulnerabilities.  

“This complexity may explain why just under half (46%) of the study admitted to still being ‘on the road’ to multi-cloud, taking it a step at a time,” concluded Tebay. “Despite this, almost a quarter (23%) of IT decision-makers said that their use of multi-cloud was ‘plain sailing’ and that they’re seeing significant benefits, which shows the real impact of a mature, well-thought-out approach to multi-cloud.” 

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