“Clouding the issue” – what’s driving cloud adoption in UK business?

eFax recently conducted a survey investigating why UK businesses are increasingly choosing to deploy cloud solutions. The research, conducted across a range of industries such as financial, retail and manufacturing, revealed that there has been a significant corporate adoption of cloud services, with 83% of respondents stating that they are currently using the cloud in some shape or form. This is a clear indication that the use of cloud services in businesses is becoming increasingly commonplace, and that UK PLC is willing to invest in the right technology, despite tighter budgets to help streamline a variety of internal processes and boost overall productivity levels.

With minimal hardware requirement, and an increasing demand from business professionals to access documents quickly and easily, the primary reason (59%) businesses cited for choosing cloud solutions, was the flexibility and scalability that this type of technology enables. Boosting efficiency and minimising costs were equally popular motives with 45% of respondents identifying these reasons for their shift to the cloud.

Of course it’s no surprise to see cost play a role when margins are being squeezed from every angle; suppliers want to charge more because of increasing overheads, customers demand a better deal because of reduced available income, more aggressive competition necessitating higher standards along with an increasingly strict regulatory environment all contribute to reduced margins. The lack of hardware required with cloud services, coupled with automatic software updates, means it dramatically reduces the cost required to maintain current business technology, along with simplifying the lives of many IT departments.
Yet when participants were asked about the pressures that are forcing businesses to boost productivity and reduce costs, it is worrying that only 24% felt that compliance was a factor; less than customer expectations, the economy, competition, the board and increasing overheads. In today’s heavily regulated environment, it is surprising that businesses aren’t feeling the pressure of compliance more. It’d be great to believe that 76% of respondents are on top of compliance regulations, but if not, then they need to consider whether the repercussions of failing to comply with industry regulations are worth the risk.

Last year, the Bank of Scotland was fined after repeatedly faxing customers' account details, including bank statements, mortgage application letters, payslips, national insurance numbers, driving licence and passport information to the wrong recipients, in direct violation of the data protection act. Cloud solutions, such as internet faxing provide a secure delivery method for documents, meaning staff can fax safely, reliably and more importantly, to the correct fax number with no manual dialling involved. The Information Commissioner’s Office found that the Bank of Scotland failed to take sufficient technical and organisational measures against repeated unauthorised processing of personal data that would mitigate human error and levied a £75,000 fine to reflect the seriousness of the matter.

Aside from the obvious factors of productivity and keeping costs low, the research found that higher customer expectations (55%), the economy (54%) and competition (53%) were all common friction points forcing companies to re-evaluate how they do business, rethink their IT requirements and move to the cloud. It makes sense following more than five years of focusing on vigorous cost control, UK businesses are running out of opportunities for major value creation from corporate cost cutting. New value will have to be created by growing the top line and not just by cutting costs and taking the savings to the bottom line. Of course cost control will remain a major driver of IT investment for years to come, but it will have to be increasingly supplemented by the return of the focus on growth. And the cloud is helping many organisations, both large and small, to take advantage of easier and cheaper enterprise-grade level IT cloud services to do just this.

Ultimately, the fact that a high proportion of the businesses surveyed are already using cloud technology, indicates the willingness to invest in the right technology if it helps improve business productivity, and reduces the spend on implementing IT services. The challenge of keeping these costs low and productivity high are long standing business issues, but it’s what companies are doing to combat these challenges that is different. Cloud has the power to help organisations overcome a number of obstacles; with its flexibility, low cost, and easy deployment means that businesses can put realistic plans in place for growth, rather than simply survival.