Worldwide 'whole cloud' revenues to reach $554B in 2021: IDC
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Research firm IDC has released its first forecast of the whole cloud. Overall, IDC expects worldwide whole cloud revenues to reach $554 billion in 2021, more than double those of 2016. This includes public, private, and hybrid clouds, along with managed cloud services, cloud-related professional services, and hardware and software infrastructure for building clouds.
IDC estimates that in 2016, public cloud services accounted for 41 percent of all cloud-related spending. By 2021, it will increase to 48 percent. When spending on hardware and software to enable public cloud services, and managed and professional services around the cloud are included, these figures rise to 65 percent for 2016 and 68 percent for 2021.
Spending on managed and professional services around cloud adoption is expected to account for 31 percent of all cloud-related spending in 2016 and 2021, IDC found.
The research expects cloud services providers to dominate, by 2021 accounting for 76 percent of cloud-related infrastructure hardware and software spending.
Past years have included new services from public cloud service providers like blockchain services, IoT back-end data services, encryption services, and serverless computing services. Going forward, IDC expects an expansion of enterprise workloads on the cloud, as new deployment scenarios for workloads are found.
"The most obvious takeaway from this forecast is that the shift to the cloud consumption model - in all its forms -- is a mass movement, and will continue to be such over the forecast period," said Frank Gens, SVP and chief analyst at IDC, said. "Equally important, though, is the steady drumbeat of tech innovation that is coming from the major public cloud suppliers, making it virtually impossible for enterprises and developers seeking advantage through IT not to embrace the public cloud."
In a July research note, IDC forecasted Sofware-as-a-Service (SaaS) will dominate as the top cloud computing type, capturing two-thirds of all public cloud spending this year.
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