SAP’s industry cloud simplifies access to innovative vertical solutions across industries. Built by SAP and our partners on an open platform, these solutions are interoperable with our intelligent suite, enabling you to drive business transformation profitably and sustainably, seize new opportunities, and manage business disruption and changes within your industry.[1]

Figure 1. The Industry Cloud in 2021

Figure 1 shows Cloud computing has emerged as the biggest enabler for the world economy, businesses and remote workforces during the coronavirus pandemic, and will continue to be imperative for organizations looking for increased scalability, business continuity and cost efficiency in 2021.

According to Gartner, the worldwide spending on public cloud will grow by 18.4 percent in 2021 to a total of 304.9 billion dollars, up from 257.5 billion dollars in 2020. The cloud’s ability to offer pay-per-use, scalable models to achieve cost efficiency and business continuity is providing an impetus for organizations to rapidly accelerate their cloud migration journey. [2]

Advantages of Industry Cloud

The key advantage of Industry Cloud is that it addresses the problems of systemic risks that most organisations face with security, regulatory, and compliance. In addition, there are other advantages such as:

• Standardized configurations
• Improved operational efficiency
• Deeper customer engagement
• Focused spends
• Customized holistic solutions [3]

Future of Cloud Industry

Further, a Gartner report states that the proportion of IT spending that is shifting to cloud has increased in the aftermath of rapid adoption of the “work from home” model, with cloud projected to make up 14.2 percent of the total global enterprise IT spending market in 2024, up from 9.1 percent in 2020. Although software as a service (SaaS) remains the largest market segment and is predicted to grow to 117.7 billion dollars in 2021, while platform as a service (PaaS) is anticipated to grow by a higher margin at 26.6 percent. The increased consumption of PaaS is driven by the need to modernize the legacy applications and the underlying infrastructure to reduce latency, and achieve cost efficiency and better performance.

As expectations keep growing, the cloud will continue to evolve and innovate. However, the potential benefits of cloud haven’t been utilized by all industries uniformly, as some industries have unique demands in terms of data localization, protection or compliance laws. For instance, the financial services industry is highly regulated and, therefore, requires a cloud partner that understands the nuances of security, compliance, edge computing, software-defined network functions, etc. Hence, major public cloud providers are recognizing this need and investing in “Industry-Cloud” solutions to meet specialized business requirements.[2]

References:

1. https://www.sap.com/india/industries/industry-cloud.html
2. https://www.dqindia.com/industry-cloud-growing-cloud-trend-watch-2021/
3. https://www.dqindia.com/industry-cloud-next-big-thing-cloud-computing/

Cite this article:

Nandhinidwaraka. S (2021), The Industry Cloud in 2021, AnaTechmaz, pp. 31