NEWS & BUSINESS
61% of UK enterprises deploy or plan for virtualised enterprise applications, says Ciena
providers (37 per cent). So called “bill shock’ – the potential for run-away and unexpected costs resulting from an unplanned increase in the use of on-demand virtual services - is a significant concern. More than one third (37 per cent) of respondents still want a fixed monthly contract or a flat annual fee (34 per cent) to insulate from the costs of a demand spike. Joe Marsella, CTO EMEA, at Ciena, commented, “Software and virtualisation, combined with new DevOps style approaches, are key components for flexible and adaptive ICT and they also essential to establish a more agile business culture. By enhancing services with virtual applications that appeal to enterprises, improve service velocity and incorporate the flexibility needed to build, trial and release applications more rapidly, the service providers will strengthen their ability to compete.”
solutions as important or very important versus single-vendor solutions. This highlights the need for open, multi-vendor, multi- domain environments and unique partnerships that can deliver more disruptive, user-enabled services. Speed of new service deployment was flagged as very important by 41 per cent of respondents, while more, 49 per cent, highlighted the importance of virtualised applications to support rapid expansion of company IT infrastructure to new business units, partners and branches. This is in line with the drive to a DevOps-style approach to help modify new services and add new resources more quickly and easily. When selecting network function virtualisation (NFV) solutions or virtualised enterprise applications, 56 per cent of respondents
virtualised applications, such as software-based managed services like routers, encryption, firewalls and WAN optimisation services, which have traditionally been based on dedicated hardware. The Ciena survey illustrates the investment plans and views of enterprises around virtualised service delivery and their key decision factors when selecting vendors and managed service providers to implement these technologies.
Demand for virtualised applications, services and virtual network functions (VNFs) in the UK has tipped into the business mainstream with nearly two-thirds of enterprises (61%) either already investing in some form of virtualised application or planning to do so in the next 12 months. The significant extent of the adoption of virtualised applications, enterprises’ purchase preferences and strategies for these technologies was among the findings from a new independent study commissioned by Ciena and conducted by Opinion Matters. The study assessed
KEY FINDINGS Almost all (93 per cent) respondents rate a mix of best-of-breed, interoperable virtual
prefer working with established, major IT
vendors, followed by their existing connectivity service
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ISSUE 7 | Q3 2016
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