Private Cloud high on agenda as applications remain vital to business

When asked which technologies will have strategic importance in the next 2-5 years, private cloud ranked highest among organisations, with mobile apps a close second.

Totalling 59 per cent and 56 per cent respectively, the figures come from new research by F5 Networks’ 2015 State of Application Delivery survey, which indicate that the strategic importance of Cloud-based and mobile apps will continue to increase, as will the number of applications requiring services and the complexity involved in their deployment.

Providing insight into the current state of application delivery, more than 300 F5 customers from a broad range of vertical markets (including financial services, telecommunications, public sector, and consumer products) shared their perspectives on emerging trends and technologies that impact application delivery.

Results show that current application environments are huge, and growing, with 20 per cent of respondents deploying between 201-500 applications, and 28 per cent deploying around 1-200 applications.

“Applications are vital to business operations, as are the application services designed to improve performance, enhance security, and ensure reliability,” says Dean Darwin, SVP, Marketing, F5 Networks.

“The data from F5’s first survey in exploring the state of application delivery confirms the role these services play in successful application deployments.

“As customers incorporate public, private, and hybrid Cloud models, application service offerings must also continue to evolve to address complexity and meet new and existing challenges.”

According to Darwin, application availability also edges security in importance.

When asked which services they couldn’t imagine deploying an application without, availability services was the top-ranking category with 40 per cent of responses. Security services ranked nearly as high at 30 per cent with respondents reinforcing the belief that if an application isn’t available, other services aren’t considered as important.

Other key takeaways from the research show that API-enabled infrastructure needs to drive business agility.

“Programmability is a key component for DevOps, SDN, and Cloud computing,” the report states.

“F5 customers responding to the survey assigned importance to programmatic technologies and capabilities within the network infrastructure, indicating a substantial shift toward the adoption of customisable automation and orchestration of network services.”

Finally, Darwin believes software defined networking (SDN) must reduce operating expenses.

“Customers continue to be interested in SDN as a means to operationalise their networks,” he adds.

According to the survey, two-thirds of respondents are considering SDN to reduce operating expenses.

“In order to progress from today’s early adopter stage to widespread implementation, SDN must address this requirement,” the report concludes.