Cloud computing growth ‘outstripping rest of IT spending’

Businesses are set to focus on purchasing cloud computing services over the course of 2011.

Formtek blogger Dick Weisinger said this is one of the key findings from a recent International Data Corporation (IDC) report, with spending on cloud applications due to increase by around 30 per cent.

This is nearly five times more than on other IT solutions, with general global spending on services set to go up by approximately six per cent this year.

Stephen Minton, vice president at IDC, said: "This will be a big year for the cloud … It will be a change in the way companies are doing their computing in the long term."

Both private and public cloud computing services are expected to grow in popularity as 2011 continues.

Glenn Wightwick, director of IBM Research and Development – Australia and chief technologist for IBM Australia, recently told the ZDNet website that a large number of companies have decided to take a "practical and prudent" approach to cloud computing, taking their time to assess how the technology could benefit them.