Avanade re-commissioned the same research firm, Kelton Research, to undertake some follow-up work between 26 August and 11 September, and the responses from over 500 C-level executives show a healthy dose of pragmatism with respect to the Cloud and its associated hype.

In amongst the pragmatism, it was interesting (and pleasing) to see a “320% increase” in respondents planning some sort of deployment. Whilst it’s worth noting that this increase only took the ‘planning to use’ contingent up to the dizzying heights of some 10% of respondents, the figure was a more respectable 23% in the USA. In the same data, companies reporting ‘no plans’ to adopt Cloud tools had fallen globally from 54% to 37%. That’s interesting.

Also interesting was the relatively small impact of the economic situation upon Cloud adoption, with only 13% suggesting it had ‘helped’ adoption plans and 58% reporting ‘no effect.’ In my conversations with Nick Carr and others, there’s been an underlying presumption (on my part, as well as theirs) that cost-saving arguments with respect to Cloud Computing would prove persuasive and compelling. It would appear not. This would suggest, of course, that Enterprise adopters are taking to the Cloud for reasons other than the budget sheet… which is hopefully one more nail in the coffin for IDC’s recent ‘advice’.

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