APJ enterprises are comfortable with hybrid IT, see service delivery benefits

Source: CenturyLink infographic 1. Percentage of respondents who said they are focused on an activity as part of digital transformation, from the CenturyLink Asia Pacific Hybrid IT Readiness Report 2016. Three quarters of respondents are increasing outsourcing, for instance.

A new report from CenturyLink reveals that hybrid IT is now the pervasive IT infrastructure model for organisations in Asia Pacific and Japan (APJ).

According to the CenturyLink Asia Pacific Hybrid IT Readiness Report 2016, 73% of organisations are aware of the hybrid IT deployment model. Hybrid IT refers to managing some IT infrastructure and IT services in-house, and outsourcing some of it, on a mix of private and public cloud platforms.  Three-quarters of respondents already outsource at least one or more data centre, network, security or applications services to third party managed service providers. In addition, 84% of organisations cite security as the key driver to consider managed service providers.

The report also found that service delivery improvements involving data centres (63%) and networks (52%) are key drivers for executives to outsource IT services. Today’s increasingly complex IT environments demand heightened expertise and management capabilities to ensure continual improvements in service delivery to customers - skillsets which may be difficult to source in-house.

“Digital disruption is changing the way we approach business today globally. In particular, IT departments are experiencing tremendous change as organisations turn IT into a driving force for all aspects of the business, including the customer experience,” said Gery Messer, MD, Asia Pacific, CenturyLink.

“As more organisations turn to a blend of in-house and third-party IT services, it is important for leaders to address concerns on security. They need to carefully assess their technology partners to ensure that security capabilities are well embedded in all of their offerings – managed hosting, managed services, network solutions, colocation and cloud. Only then will they be able to help IT transform into a secure hub for innovation.”

A hybrid IT model requires strategic alignment between internal and external IT professionals to match business applications to their best execution venue. This approach to rapidly provision IT services while enabling risk mitigation is appealing to security-conscious executives. Other concerns in transitioning to the hybrid IT model include senior management reluctance for 44% of organizations and migration or consolidation issues for 38% of organisations.

“As industries continue to transform, paradigm shift is inevitable,” said Ajay Sunder, VP - Telecoms, Frost & Sullivan Asia Pacific. “The transformation journey from traditional IT to hybrid IT becomes the new normal for enterprises across Asia Pacific. This is a result of organisational priorities as they keep up with business growth momentum. There is no one-size-fits-all strategy. As technology diversifies at a rapid space, IT leaders should focus on what will work best for the organisation. They will require technology partners that can provide services that will give them greater visibility and control while enabling them to transform their business in this digital economy.”

Interested?

The CenturyLink Asia Pacific Hybrid IT Readiness Report 2016 surveyed 600 decision-makers across six key APAC markets in September 2016. Download the report

View the infographics: Hybrid IT, Security, and Service Delivery Improvements (PDFs)

Read the TechTrade Asia blog post on key takeaways from the report