Report to be distributed at Star Customer Event: 7 July Madejski Stadium in Reading
LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM, 23rd JUNE 2010 – Star, a provider of on-demand computing and communication services to UK businesses, today announced the publication of a research paper, completed in conjunction with analyst firm Quocirca. The report explores the role of IT in business, with a particular focus on how technology can help drive business value up. The paper, 'Cloud Computing: Taking IT to Task' commissioned by Star and completed by Quocirca Service Director, Clive Longbottom, describes how technology has to be seen as a facilitator of business processes by efficiently automating sequences of tasks. The paper acts as a guide to business and IT professionals running small and mid sized UK businesses who are confused about how they might utilise cloud computing services in the most appropriate way.
Quocirca reports that approximately 70% of the average company's IT budget is spent on maintaining existing systems, with hardware and software upgrades, patching and general fire fighting. This leaves only 30% to be allocated to investments in new services aimed at growth by differentiating the business and driving up business value. Longbottom suggests business leaders would do well to challenge themselves and these outdated practices by finding ways to release themselves from financial constraint by getting more from existing resources that are being underutilised by the ineffective way they are allocated. In this way, UK businesses have the opportunity to accelerate the benefits technology has to offer without taking on all the operational and financial risk associated with on-premise IT, i.e. doing everything yourself.
It is further suggested that cloud service providers offer organisations greater business flexibility and market responsiveness than they could ever manage on their own. However, Longbottom also acknowledges that some things may be best done in-house. The report suggests that the key systems and processes that differentiate a company, as well as those that make it unique are, in fact, best managed by the business. With this in mind, the best place to start with cloud computing services is to take commodity tasks and applications and have those done for you under strict service level agreements. This helps free-up much of the 70% of the IT budget that is being spent simply to keep the lights on while more resources can then be put into the key areas where they will have most impact.
Some of the key findings in the report include:
- A business has to work from the top down, and must prioritise its processes to identify where the greatest needs are.
- Businesses should aim to free up as much resource as possible to invest in their unique and differentiated business processes.
- Business flexibility, scalability and availability of critical applications will be better served by outside agencies than in-house systems.
- Better visibility of how the ICT budget is spent, with fixed monthly pricing, will give the business better transparency, predictability and forecasting of costs.
The report concludes that businesses should look to the cloud to offload commodity technical services and to put IT back where it should be: at the heart of the business.
Clive Longbottom, Research Director at Quocirca, says, "A business is not run 'on' or 'by' technology – the real value of a business depends on its processes. That technology has become a major part of a business's means of operation can be a double-edge sword: if the technology is poor or constraining, then the business will suffer. Taking a new approach where technology is purely there to facilitate an efficient and effective dynamic process environment is key for the mid-market to help in their global competitiveness."
Martino Corbelli, Marketing Director at Star, concluded, "By deciding which IT functions to offload to an external provider, UK businesses can be freed from the constraints of traditional IT practices and better equip themselves to respond to change. This is where on-demand services can be transformative in enabling IT departments to plan more effectively and focus on strategic decisions that support the business objectives more directly."
NOTES FOR EDITORS – Customer Event: The report will be distributed to attendees at an exclusive seminar, hosted by Star, on 7th July at the Madejski Stadium in Reading.
For more information and to register for the event, please visit http://www.star.co.uk/Cloud-Computing-Taking-IT-To-Task/.
The research paper can be downloaded from http://www.star.co.uk/ccseminar-resources/