CFOs playing it safe on Cloud

We may be prepared to send a man to space…but CFOs are still cautious about investing in cloud infrastructure, that is, according to the views of CIMA finance members.

In the second of our series of CIMA survey blogs, we examine the areas in which CIMA finance leaders are pumping their money.

When asked to rate the likelihood of their company investing in the following technologies, the investment priorities for this year and the next 12-24 months are very similar.

• Companies are most likely to invest in mobile devices and applications, followed by security software
• They will also be investing in replacing/growing their current infrastructure (servers & storage)
• Major line of business applications and cloud based applications and DR are less likely
• Cloud based infrastructure is the least likely investment

65% of respondents said they had invested in traditional infrastructure rather than cloud infrastructure. However, whereas 11% of companies said that they have invested in cloud infrastructure in the past 12 months, 27% of respondents said they were likely or very likely to invest in cloud infrastructure in the next 12 to 24 months. As planned spend on cloud investment is set to double, cloud will be firmly on the table in the next wave of infrastructure investment.

“We can also infer from the survey results that people are ‘dipping their toes’ in cloud, with investment in infrastructure likely to double over the course of the next 12 to 24 months.”

Lee Ganly, CTO at Acora

But why the slow growth?

“It isn’t easy to move everything over to cloud in one clean sweep, for a number of reasons, including the financial model – which may require a reshaping of IT operations from capex to opex. In addition, concerns over security may be slowing full-scale adoption.”

Lee Ganly, CTO at Acora

In terms of investment priorities, as companies react to the demands of the digital workforce, it is no surprise that security software is very high on their agenda. This trend is particularly prevalent in the financial services space.

Line of Business application change continues to be a popular area for investment in businesses and doesn’t show any signs of slowing down. Thirty per cent of respondents have carried out a major line of business application change and 50% of respondents are planning to carry out a major application change over the next 12-24 months.