Companies overcome cloud fear

German companies are considered hesitant when it comes to cloud migration. Even today, in 2021, many of them are still not fully convinced of the cloud: every tenth company does not use the cloud at all, almost a third still works classically on-premises and only uses the cloud selectively.

But the trend towards the cloud is definitely picking up speed in Germany. This is the conclusion of a study conducted by Techconsult on behalf of Mimecast. This was conducted in December 2020 among 200 decision-makers in German companies.

How far companies are in cloud adoption depends on both industry and size. Companies with up to 999 employees use the cloud predominantly or almost 100 percent of the time. This puts them well ahead of companies with 1000 to 4999 employees, 56.9 percent of which use the cloud predominantly or almost completely.

For larger groups, on the other hand, the figure is only 47.5 percent. In terms of industry, telecommunications is ahead of the field, with 93.8 percent relying predominantly or even 100 percent on the cloud. Industry (69 percent) and retail (66.7 percent) follow in second and third place. Of course, the process of cloud migration is complex and requires good planning.

The respondents see major challenges in terms of the high costs associated with adoption (30 percent) and dependence on one provider (30 percent). Initial costs can be higher, especially at the beginning, but over time this is put into perspective as capital expenditure on hardware, software and maintenance can be saved.

The fear of vendor lock-in is initially justified. However, by paying attention to the portability of the service when choosing a provider, companies can keep this risk to a minimum.