Migration to the cloud is not an end in itself, but an enabler for more innovative ways of working. When an organization’s IT systems are not based in the cloud, they are simply more vulnerable to suffer the negative effects of disruptive innovation since they cannot innovate or react quickly enough to rapidly changing market trends. Plus, their time-to-market is significantly lengthened.
The cloud is also not just a machine: it allows room for more expansive innovation. Cloud-based organizations have access to new tools and capabilities that aren’t viable in an on-premise setting. Additionally, this allows them to gain new insights derived from data that they wouldn’t be able to access via existing on-premise IT data centres. For example, once legacy systems are moved to the cloud, extracting the data and combining it with data from other sources to derive value becomes a much more manageable task.
This is why we often see start-ups gaining market share without being challenged by the incumbent companies in that industry. Not only are start-ups not tied to legacy systems, but they usually run exclusively on the cloud, allowing them to launch key services quickly and scale their systems in line with their rapid growth.
A recent study found that more than half of CIOs spent 40-60% of their time managing legacy IT systems. This is a huge amount of time spent just on maintaining operations. In contrast, enterprise organizations that make the transition to cloud can use that time to focus on initiatives that drive future business value and innovation.
So why is innovation so important to cloud migration projects now? Here’s the short answer: how an organization defines its original aims and strategic goals associated with migrating legacy systems to the cloud will shape the project’s outcome. Those focusing on cost savings will likely see initial cost savings, but will in most cases not see any effect on their innovative power. Those that see cloud migration as an enabler of innovation are more likely to remain competitive in a world that demands rapid access to innovative digital services.