Majority of organizations to accelerate their cloud migration in a post-COVID world: Study

COVID-19 has become a powerful catalyst for rapid cloud migration, according to LogicMonitor’s Cloud 2025 study of 500 global IT decision makers, which examines the future of cloud workloads and the long-term impacts of COVID-19 on IT organizations in North America, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand.

The study, fielded during May – June 2020, found that 87% of global IT decision makers agree that the COVID-19 pandemic will cause organizations to accelerate their migration to the cloud. Specifically, nearly three quarters (74%) of respondents believe that, within the next five years, 95% of all workloads will be in the cloud. Many IT decisions makers around the world are even more optimistic than that, with 37% of respondents in the APAC region saying 95% of workloads will reach the cloud by 2022, compared with 35% of US/Canada respondents and 30% of UK respondents. 

That is a strikingly different tone from similar LogicMonitor research conducted in 2017, when 13% did not think the shift would ever happen, and 62% of respondents thought it would take five years or more for 95% of workloads to run in the cloud.

“Fast forward to today, and the COVID-19 pandemic has magnified the importance of the cloud in large and small enterprises as a vital asset to business operations,” said Tej Redkar, Chief Product Officer at LogicMonitor. “It is clear that organizations are hastening their cloud migration during the crisis, as the cloud is enabling them to operate remotely now while also serving as the foundation for digital transformation and ongoing innovation.”

Remote work speeds shift to cloud

Indeed, survey respondents made it clear that remote work was a driving force behind cloud migration. “If things go smoothly initially with remote work [as a result of COVID-19], then I expect increased efficiency and much more cloud usage,” noted one IT decision maker.

This sentiment was echoed by another survey respondent: “In a fully remote workforce scenario, there will be cost savings in terms of office leases, but more money will be spent on remote IT services. Everything will be in the cloud — including more automation and Internet of Things (IoT).”

The decline of on-premises

The study also revealed that global IT decision makers anticipate a decline in on-premises (on-prem) workloads over the next five years amidst accelerating shifts to the cloud. Prior to COVID-19, 35% of workloads resided on-prem, according to survey respondents. However, by 2025, they believe only 22% of workloads will reside on-prem. This represents a drop of 13%.

“If everyone is remote, companies will have to switch from on-prem infrastructure to more cloud-based infrastructures,” commented one IT decision maker on why his organization is accelerating its cloud migration.

Respondents from all three regions anticipated a significant decline in on-prem workloads between now and 2025. IT decision makers based in the US and Canada believe that on-prem workloads will fall from 35% today to 22% by 2025. In the UK, 38% of workloads currently on-prem are expected to decline to 21% by 2025. In Australia and New Zealand, 32% of workloads housed on-prem today are expected to decline to 24% by 2025.

Cloud workloads evenly split

Survey respondents believe workloads will remain evenly split between private and public clouds, even though more workloads overall will migrate to the cloud. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, global IT decision makers identified 23% of workloads as residing in the public cloud, and 25% in the private cloud. By 2025, these same decision makers believe 28% of workloads will reside in the public cloud, and 30% in the private cloud.