95 per cent of European businesses now have a digital strategy, finds Claranet research

New research has found a surge in the number of Chief Digital Officers (CDO) across Europe over the past 12 months. The new figures show the growing significance of the digital transformation agenda and the need for many to prioritise it with a distinct role at the board level, according to Claranet.

Vanson Bourne surveyed 900 end user IT leaders from mid-market businesses in the six markets in which Claranet operates – Germany, Benelux, France, Spain, Portugal, and the UK. It found that 95 per cent of European businesses now have a digital strategy. 15 per cent of these digital strategies are now led by a CDO, up from just 6 per cent in 2015. This trend is particularly pronounced in France and Portugal, where CDOs head up 22 per cent and 20 per cent of digital strategies. These findings show how seriously European businesses are taking their digital transformations.

The Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and the Chief Information Officer (CIO) are still most likely to drive digital strategies, at 34 per cent and 29 per cent. However, the rise of the CDO is indicative of wider trends across IT departments.

Commenting on the research, Andy Wilton, CIO of Claranet, said:

The fact that we are seeing a broad split in leadership between CTOs, CIOs and now the growth in CDOs, demonstrates the different approaches organisations are taking toward digital transformation. It is also indicative of a changing IT department where traditional roles are becoming more hybridised.”

IT is progressing from a support function to a value-creating role of strategic significance. Harvey Nash and KPMG recently found that even where there is no CDO, the CIO’s role is becoming ever more dynamic and strategic. Traditionally, a CIO’s priorities have been increasing operational efficiencies and delivering stable IT performance. These are becoming less important in the face of these changes.

Wilton concluded:

“The IT department of 2016 is undergoing a period of accelerating change. Where IT used to play a supporting role to business strategy, it now has the opportunity to drive it. Businesses can lead change by empowering their IT departments – be that by appointing a Chief Digital Officer or by increasing the remit of the CIO to generate profit rather than to provide cost-savings.”

Leading managed services provider Claranet, alongside its recent acquisition, managed AWS specialist Bashton, is to be the Platinum Sponsor of the 2016 Amazon Web Service (AWS) Summit in London. Claranet’s sponsorship of the event, due to be held at the ExCel Centre on 6-7 July, demonstrates its development into a key European-wide provider of managed services on AWS.

The AWS Summit in London is designed to educate customers about the significant benefits cloud can have for their businesses. Claranet views the event sponsorship as an ideal opportunity to showcase its range of managed services on AWS infrastructure, and to explain how they open up the benefits of AWS to businesses. Managed AWS pioneer and Bashton founder, Sam Bashton will also be talking at the event, while his team will offer on-stand workshop sessions.

Michel Robert, Managing Director of Claranet UK, commented:

We take pride in being the sole Platinum Sponsor of the 2016 AWS Summit in London, a move that is indicative of our commitment, ambition and expertise within the field of managed AWS services. Having experienced high customer demand for these services, we have built a European-wide cloud practice that is bringing the transformational benefits of managed AWS services to businesses across Europe. We are now able to provide the best application availability, performance and security on an individual case basis, whether the application is hosted on customer premises, Claranet’s infrastructure or on AWS.”

Claranet’s growing cloud practice works together to share insights and expertise from different European markets. Claranet acquired UK business Bashton in 2016 to bolster its DevOps and AWS expertise, and acquired AWS specialists Morea in France and Celingest in Spain the year previously. Its customers today include ITV, BBC Worldwide, Orange, Superdry, Dassault, Bandai Namco, Liverpool Football Club, and Virgin Holidays.

Robert concluded:

We’re in a strong position to help our customers take advantage of AWS because of our heritage in both hosting and network services, allowing us to draw different services together into a single offering that drives our customers forward. Claranet has been a future-facing company throughout its 20 year history. We see the way in which cloud platforms like AWS are transforming the way many businesses are operating, and are delighted to be sponsoring this event.”

Last week, the United Kingdom voted to leave the EU, throwing up huge questions over the future of the country. Among the biggest are those surrounding competitiveness of the pound and the economy as a whole, and, in the IT industry, the questions are flying as thick and fast as anywhere else.

What is going to happen?

Evaluation based on completeness of vision and ability to execute

Claranet has been positioned as a Leader in Gartner’s 2016 Magic Quadrant for Managed Hybrid Cloud Hosting, Europe, for the fourth year running. Claranet believes that its placement in the Quadrant, which includes managed services on public cloud for the first time, re-affirms its market-leading position in the European hosting industry.

Gartner has revised the criteria for its IaaS and hosting Magic Quadrants this year to take into account the evolving market. While there is still a focus on locally-hosted services in Europe, public cloud services are gaining in popularity throughout Europe; a change that has been reflected in the name and evaluation criteria for Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Managed Hybrid Cloud Hosting.

Charles Nasser, CEO of Claranet, commented:

We see hybrid IT as a key differentiator for us and have, over the past two years, invested heavily in our public cloud capabilities to ensure that we can offer a complete range of hosted services. Applications and data are what matters to organisations, and at Claranet we believe that availability, security and performance are the essential elements in ensuring effective application delivery. These requirements vary from application to application, and getting the right infrastructure services in place for each application environment is key.

Public cloud services are now a key part of the solution to the optimum delivery of applications and data, but they’re not the answer for everything. A service provider who can help manage applications across multiple platforms, such as its own infrastructure, and the customer’s premises, underpinned by an integrated network, is essential. Claranet’s heritage in network provision is a key component of our cloud proposition. It enhances our value in the market and is something that sets us apart from many of our competitors. By offering network-integrated services, we can take advantage of the growing popularity of hybrid cloud and bypass the challenges associated with managing disparate IT environments for our customers.”

In its latest report, published by Tiny Haynes et al. on June 28, 2016, Gartner states:

Leaders have proved they have staying power in this market, can frequently innovate on their existing products and can be relied upon for enterprise-class needs. They have proved their technical competence and ability to deliver services to a wide range of customers. They can also address multiple cases with stand-alone or integrated solutions.”

The Gartner Magic Quadrant assessment offers snapshots of markets and their participants. It enables users to map vendor strengths against their current and future needs. Gartner evaluated Claranet’s hosting portfolio on both its completeness of vision and its ability to execute using 15 weighted criteria.

Nasser concluded:

IT departments are a key strategic asset to business, and need to focus on innovation and adding value; something that they will struggle to do without the right suppliers supporting them. Businesses who have their application and infrastructure services optimised are able to act faster and be more effective. When this happens, organisations become more agile, efficient and innovative.”

To find out more about this year’s Magic Quadrant for Managed Hybrid Cloud Hosting, Europe, 2016, and to read a full version of the report, along with a foreword by our CEO and founder, Charles Nasser, please continue below:

Read the full Gartner report

A cybersecurity breach costs on average $3.5 million. Typically, it goes undetected for 209 days, and it takes 32 days to respond appropriately once it has been detected [1]. To make matters worse, there is a one million person shortfall in security experts, according to CISCO [2].

So whether or not your organization is prepared for a cyberattack could be the difference between success and failure. Here’s the outline of a plan:

Prepare

The most important part of a plan is the objective.

If you’ve ever attended an official Amazon Web Services event like the AWS Summit, where Amazon is presenting its latest updates and services to potential customers, you’ll have noticed a big area next to the lecture theatres: the partner zone.

Some people ask: why does AWS put such emphasis on their partners? Does AWS not have a business strategy like IBM or HP?

Claranet and Bashton (a Claranet Group Company) are the proud Platinum Sponsor of the AWS Summit London on 6-7 July.

Cloud computing is radically changing the way companies do IT and is accelerating innovation in companies of all sizes.

The summit is designed to equip new customers with knowledge about the agility and capacity for innovation that AWS can bring to their business. It consists of two days:

Enterprise Summit: 6th July, ExCeL, London

Universal recognition of benefits presented by DevOps approach, though implementation challenges remain

DevOps has been hailed as a way for organisations to achieve greater business agility, but research conducted by Claranet reveals that DevOps can have wider-reaching business benefits. However, these benefits will only be realised if DevOps adoptees can overcome their infrastructural, organisational and cultural challenges.

The research, which surveyed 900 IT decision-makers from the UK, France, Germany, Spain, Portugal and the Benelux, found that while a growing minority (32 per cent, up from 26% last year) have implemented a DevOps approach, 100 per cent of those organisations have seen benefits of some sort. Looking at the benefits most likely to be achieved, six in ten (60 per cent) reported having better applications, 56 per cent have seen understanding between employees improve and 55 per cent have increased their profitability.

However, making a success of DevOps has, for the vast majority (92 per cent), not been without its challenges, with many encountering cultural, skills and technical issues. 40 per cent, for example, said that there was a lack of business understanding of how to leverage DevOps strategically, 36 per cent struggled with unstable infrastructure and a quarter (24 per cent) encountered cultural resistance internally.

Commenting on the findings, Claranet’s Product Director, Neil Thomas, said:

A growing number of businesses have turned to DevOps as a way of achieving competitive advantage and keeping pace with the quickening business tempo, but it’s clear that the benefits are far wider, driving a better quality output in addition to speed and agility. If you can get it right, DevOps can be hugely advantageous. It generally means more efficient working across the organisation, where technical teams can better understand the business needs, and improved software, which allows work to develop smoothly, with fewer hiccups and fewer bugs. With both operations and development teams working towards a shared goal you can do away with battles for budgets and create an environment in which creativity and innovation can thrive.

We are at a position in the software industry where cloud, or dynamic and changeable infrastructure, has given us the opportunity to change how we design, deliver and operate our software systems – which is where DevOps comes in. But businesses need to have the right infrastructure and management processes in place for it to work effectively.

While getting the right tools and processes in place is critical, culture can be a real stumbling block, primarily because operations and development teams traditionally approached things very differently. At a very simplistic level, developers look to change things while operations teams look to preserve them. They need to welcome the changes involved in this shift in approach, be ready to adapt to changing circumstances and be more flexible about job functions.”

Claranet research indicates disconnect between CIOs and IT staff on attitudes to innovation

Despite a consensus that IT innovation leads to business gains, only a third of IT staff would say that their organisation’s culture promotes effective innovation. With senior management tending to be more optimistic about their company’s ability to foster innovation than those below, there is a clear disconnect between the expectations for improvement between CIOs/IT directors and their departments. This is according to the latest research from managed services provider Claranet.

The research, which surveyed IT professionals from the UK, France, Germany, Spain, Portugal and the Benelux from a range of mid-market organisations, discovered that 42 per cent of IT directors believe their organisational culture supports innovation and takes risks. However, just 30 per cent of middle management and 27 per cent for IT supervisors would agree. Similarly, while half (51 per cent) of CIOs believe that their organisation has the patience to support new ideas, only 40 per cent of intermediate management and supervisors believe that to be the case.

According to Michel Robert, Claranet’s UK managing director, the effectiveness of innovation strategies will suffer unless company stances on innovation filter through the whole of the IT department:

These results show clear differences between IT directors and less senior staff on their views on innovation within their businesses. Senior IT staff have a distinct view of their openness to innovative practices, though on the whole, it would seem that they are not the best at ensuring their IT teams feel innovation is being prioritised.

These disparities may be down to a lack of communication and capacity to innovate, which will need to be addressed if businesses are to create a culture in which innovation can thrive and reach their full potential. If IT staff do not feel the need to innovate or, indeed, do not feel able to spend time on it, they can quite easily become stuck in the same old processes leading to the business losing traction with its competitors.

As senior managers grapple with the idea of digital transformation and innovation, it’s important that they keep their eyes on the reality of their businesses. Working with a trusted partner can ease the load on the IT department, freeing up IT directors and their teams to successfully focus on their innovation strategies. By focusing on innovative, high value-add projects close to the business, and leaving day-to-day management to IT services providers, IT directors will more than likely deliver business success to their organisation.”