70pc CIOs change technology for digital future

MUMBAI, INDIA: Torrential changes will reshape the service provider landscape over the next several years as organizations struggle to adjust to a digital future, according to Gartner.

A recent survey found that 70 percent of CIOs will change their technology and sourcing relationships in the next two to three years for a variety of reasons.

"The picture is clear for service providers as clients are struggling to keep up with change. They are strongly considering changing the providers they work with as part of responding to this change. Market share will shift to service providers able to help clients respond to the business and IT opportunities and challenges that are overwhelming more than half of organizations today. Service providers need to convert this picture into an opportunity rather than a threat," said Eric Rocco, managing VP at Gartner.

"Digital business is an unstoppable and irresistible catalyst for change that will affect the fundamental foundations and baseline assumptions of every business.

"The digital business revolution is underpinned and enabled by the macro technology forces of cloud, social, analytics, mobility and the Internet of Things. Not every business fundamental will need to change to the same degree, nor will every technology driver have a role to play in every business scenario; however, businesses that decide to 'wait and see' are likely to become irrelevant."

Gartner believes that assisting clients in digital business transformation will be a driving factor in the majority of IT services opportunities.

Consumerization and its impact on buyer expectations for consumer quality service experiences will reshape provider evaluation and selection criteria. Consequently, finding and capitalizing on unexpected sources of growth is the strategic issue facing all service providers.

Gartner sees the Nexus of Forces forming the very fiber that defines next-generation services. Services of tomorrow will lean on scaled and industrialized delivery models that provide clients access to services that are consumed to drive specific business outcomes.

Cloud-based infrastructure as a service (IaaS) and business process as a service (BPaaS) are the two fastest-growing segments, expanding 44.9 and 12.4 percent, respectively, in 2014. Agility, not cost, will be the primary reason that many organizations adopt cloud computing. Cloud-based services are cannibalizing more traditional models.

This is most apparent in infrastructure outsourcing where infrastructure utility services (IUS), managed services based on IaaS technology, and cloud IaaS growth include workloads moving from more traditional data center managed services to IUS and IaaS, respectively. Hybrid IT environments will dominate client IT architectures over the next several years. This underscores the importance of skills in the old-world legacy environments, as well as the new-world as-a-service operating models.