Despite a pattern of losses by public cloud services providers, a survey commissioned by Connected Data, Inc., found UK firms are still storing data in the public cloud, and few have an exit strategy in place, should things go wrong.
Overview of survey findings:
- One in five UK firms (19%) has no idea how long it would take them to get their data back if public cloud services went bust
- Over a quarter (26%) has no idea how much it would cost them to get their data back
- One in ten (12%) of businesses that were legally obliged to keep
their data in the country the business resides in, didn't know where
their data was
Public cloud model is unsustainable
The current
business model for public cloud services is unprofitable. Companies
build or rent expensive infrastructure and pay for massive amounts of
bandwidth to transfer all user data, yet most users don't pay for the
service meaning the providers are making a loss[1]. If these losses
continue, it is likely that public cloud service providers could go
bust. Despite these warnings, UK firms continue to put data on the
public cloud and few understand the impact to their business, were this
data to disappear.
Time to get the data back
The
survey of 100 UK businesses revealed over two thirds (69%) put company
data on public clouds but nearly a fifth (19%) admit that, if these
services went bust, they have no idea how quickly they could get their
data back or migrate it to another provider in such an event. 38%
thought it would take a few days, nearly one in ten (9%) thought it
might take weeks. Even a day or two without mission critical data could
have a serious knock-on effect on an organisation.
Cost to get data back
Furthermore,
over a quarter (26%) did not know what it would cost them to get their
data back. Nearly a third (31%) estimated the cost to be over £10,000.
9% suspecting it would be between £26,000 and £50,000. A further 9%
suspected it would be over £50,000.
Compliance concerns
Companies
are even leaving compliance to chance. One in ten (12%) of businesses
that were legally obliged to keep their data in the country the business
resides in, didn't know where their data actually was. Failing to meet
such requirements could lead to strict penalties and reputational
damage.
Can private cloud solve the problem?
A
private cloud appliance, such as the recently launched, Transporter, is
a purchased appliance which uses existing infrastructure and avoids the
backend costs that plague traditional cloud companies. This means it is
highly profitable. For customers this means that the data is secure in
every way. It's 100% private, no one can access or remove it and data is
stored onsite only.
"Public cloud storage - offered by companies like Dropbox and Box - are really popular," comments Geoff Barrall, CEO, Transporter. "But,
these firms are failing financially and that puts the data stored on
them at risk. What is more worrying is that our survey shows UK firms
have not fully considered this risk, partly because using the cloud is
so easy, its hard to resist."
"That is why we developed Transporter," he added: "It
gives users the same flexibility and experience as Dropbox and Box, but
it gives CIOs that all important control over their data. No UK firm
wants to be without its data for even a day, let alone weeks. They
certainly don't want to be paying to get their data back. Having data on
site gives companies peace of mind, whatever the future holds."
"With a private cloud appliance no exit strategy is required," Geoff concluded. "You
have control of your data, always. You can access it at all times from
anywhere, yet it remains onsite and under your control."
Survey Sample
A survey of 100 IT decision makers was commissioned by Connected Data and carried out by independent research company, Verve, in February 2015.
[1] Box's recent S-1 filing highlights a staggering $168 million loss
on $124 million in revenue. And the current projections for Amazon Web
Services show that Amazon is set to lose $410-810 million in Q4 (Source:
Canalys, September 2014).
