Enterprises Turn to the Public Cloud to Enable Online Services During the Pandemic

ISG Provider Lens report finds public cloud adoption rising quickly as companies continue to allow employees to work from home

STAMFORD, Conn., Nov. 19, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Enterprises worldwide are embracing the public cloud during the COVID-19 pandemic, with demand shifting toward an as-a-service IT model, according to a new report published today by Information Services Group (ISG) (Nasdaq: III), a leading global technology research and advisory firm.

The ISG Provider Lens Public Cloud – Solutions & Services Archetype Report also finds enterprises looking to cloud providers to help them run major workloads in the cloud and enable employees to work from home as the pandemic continues. As a result, traditional software vendors, including enterprise resource planning vendors, are revamping their legacy products to work in the cloud.

“The pandemic has had a major impact on the way everyone works,” said Jan Erik Aase, director and global leader, ISG Provider Lens Research. “Running workloads in the cloud gives enterprises the agility and scalability they need to enable a work-from-home model and continue to serve customers during pandemic lockdowns.”

The pandemic has created a huge demand for online shopping and other online services, and public cloud providers are helping customers adjust to this new normal, the report says. Cloud-based services also have enabled companies to host virtual business meetings and maintain customer support services.

Many cloud service providers, especially infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) and platform-as-a-service providers, have seen record-setting growth in recent months, the report says. According to the latest ISG Index, global spending on IaaS is up nearly 20 percent through the first nine months of 2020, to $17.8 billion. Many enterprises are migrating applications to the cloud to leverage artificial intelligence and cognitive capabilities for data analysis available through providers.

The report also sees a change in the way enterprises are transitioning to the cloud. Instead of a lift-and-shift approach to moving applications, many enterprises are now looking for cloud-native tools to help with the transition. In many cases, a lift-and-shift approach later requires enterprises to refactor or re-architect the workload to drive better performance, which leads to increased costs.