Couchbase Inc., a cloud database platform company, released research showing that 58 percent of enterprises are revising how they split their budget between CAPEX and OPEX due to the economic climate, with 54 percent saying the cloud is essential to balance IT spending.
Most enterprises believe further movement to the cloud is inevitable, with 44 percent looking for ways to reduce and/or control cloud spending.
A global survey of 600 senior IT decision-makers found that factors such as vendor lock-in; a lack of transparency in cloud spending and costs; and inflexible management tools added 29 percent to enterprise cloud costs in 2022.
Additionally, the survey found that on average enterprises spent $28.91 million on cloud services, resulting in an overspend of approximately $6.5 million. This indicates that flexible technologies that are transparently priced and cost-effective are best positioned to give enterprises a viable path to the cloud while driving business efficiency.
“Cloud is an essential component of the modern technology stack, offering enterprises the scalability, reliability and agility they need,” said Rahul Pradhan, VP of product and strategy at Couchbase. “More than ever, service providers need to deliver highly secure and scalable solutions, alongside flexible deployment options that deliver the right price-performance ratio for businesses. This approach gives customers agility and control over their cloud choices, helping them get the most out of their resources, freeing them to concentrate on driving and accelerating their business.”
Given that some organizations experience challenges with on-premises architecture, including employee training and infrastructure cost management, 53 percent are moving their spending from CAPEX to OPEX, with an average of 25 percent of their CAPEX spending switching.
Furthermore, by 2026, enterprises are planning for 31 percent of their total IT spend to be in the public cloud — and are 31 percent of the way to reaching this goal already.
Respondents see IT becoming more consultative, helping other departments make the right IT decisions while minimizing risk.
Key insights include:
- 85 percent have either begun changing IT’s role to do this or plan to do so in the next 12 months
- 88 percent have either begun using or plan to use low-code and no-code technologies to help other business units develop applications with minimal input from IT
- 88 percent are taking a similar approach with serverless computing so other departments can directly purchase their own cloud services
- 90 percent are providing or will provide training for other departments in order to use cloud services more effectively
This does not mean IT will abandon responsibility — only 14 percent of organizations are using the cloud to drive innovation and new services without IT’s involvement. But it does mean that the skills IT teams need will evolve, with pure technical skills matched by interpersonal, managerial and educational skills to teach the business.
For more information on Couchbase’s cloud research, visit here.
