IBM: Most companies woefully ill-prepared for digital future

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A new study from IBM has revealed many organizations are not prepared for the IT needs of the future, with many believing that a rapid transition to cloud computing is required if they are to achieve their digital transformation aims.

A survey of 380 CIOs and CTOs at mid-sized and large companies in the UK and US found that 60% were not confident that their company’s IT modernization program was future-ready. The State of IT Transformation Study, which was carried out by the Managed Infrastructure Services unit of IBM's Global Technology Services, also found that 24% of respondents believe that their company is only just starting its IT modernization journey or has yet to begin modernizing.

Increasingly, it appears that cloud computing holds the answer for businesses worried about their approach to digital transformation. More than 95% of those surveyed said that they were looking to adopt public, private, or hybrid cloud strategies, with 53% adopting an “aggressive” public cloud strategy.

Future-proofing

"Our clients are looking to accelerate IT modernization by leveraging cloud models - both public and hybrid, data, AI, automation and other key technologies to help shape, scale and manage more effectively massive, complex, global architectures," Archana Vemulapalli, General Manager of IBM Infrastructure Services - Offerings and CTO, said

"In this rapidly changing digital business environment, organizations can bring in the right technology and the right partners to help aggregate, integrate, build and maintain a scalable digital business, while also enforcing effective governance."

The need to rapidly adopt cloud solutions has been heightened by the COVID-19 pandemic, but many IT leaders believe that the increased levels of cloud adoption will persist even when the pandemic is over.  

Although migrating to the cloud offers a number of advantages for businesses looking to prepare their IT solutions for the future, the migration process itself will not necessarily be easy. As many as 40% of survey respondents felt that their teams did not have the right skills to meet their IT ambitions, suggesting that further investment in training and recruitment is required.

Barclay Ballard

Barclay has been writing about technology for a decade, starting out as a freelancer with ITProPortal covering everything from London’s start-up scene to comparisons of the best cloud storage services.  After that, he spent some time as the managing editor of an online outlet focusing on cloud computing, furthering his interest in virtualization, Big Data, and the Internet of Things.