The results of a survey released today by Rackspace Hosting (NYSE:RAX), the world's leader in hosting and cloud computing, highlight the growing problem of businesses struggling to cope with the demands of managing their own servers. More than half of the businesses surveyed responded that they would “love to never have to buy another server again”.
The research underscores Rackspace's recent launch of No More Servers, a campaign and community dedicated to a new way of buying IT, which includes managed hosting, cloud computing and e-mail hosting. Rackspace is augmenting this initiative with Rackspace.com/NoMoreServers, a location for companies to learn the benefits of hosting services.
The study, conducted by LoudHouse on behalf of Rackspace, investigated the views of more than 441 IT managers at mid-size enterprises, and revealed that approximately one-third of their IT staff's time is spent on server management, which could limit their ability to focus on strategic initiatives that could benefit the business.
Fifty-eight percent of respondents cited the 'hassle of managing servers' as a challenge for their organisation, while 61% of IT managers said 'time to drive innovation' was a challenge.
“IT should be an enabler,” said Lanham Napier, president and chief executive officer of Rackspace Hosting. “The survey seems to reveal that a huge chunk of time and resources are spent keeping the lights on and preventing problems. Rackspace, with its world-class Fanatical Support, can free organisations from the hassle of server management and enable their IT teams to focus on strategic initiatives that will positively impact the business.”
Other interesting findings from the survey include:
* Selfish servers demand IT director time
IT teams reported spending 60% of their time troubleshooting and managing servers, while only 27% of time is spent on strategic and value-add activities. On-site servers also cause 'server stress' for IT managers, who cite 'the need to be available 24x7', 'hardware issues and maintenance', and 'after-hours calls and issues' as the top three server management issues.
* Poor purchasing is problematic
More than half (51%) of respondents have made mistakes in their server capacity planning. Fifteen percent have bought too many servers and 36% have failed to buy enough. This leaves businesses exposed to the risks of financial waste and the inability to cope with user demand by not getting server spending right the first time.
* Attitudes toward cloud computing
Thirty-five percent of companies identify themselves as 'proactive and slightly ahead of the curve' when it comes to describing their approach to new technologies, while 28% remain 'cautious and reactive'. When it comes to hosting and cloud computing, barriers to adoption include assurances of reliability (29%), evidence of cost savings (28%) and assurances of security (27%).
The survey
Rackspace's survey research was conducted in September 2009 through online surveys. It involved 441 US and UK-based IT decision-makers at companies with 100-500 employees. Detailed information, methodology and the full survey report can be found at: http://www.rackspace.com/downloads/surveys/NoMoreServersSurvey.pdf
No More Servers
No More Servers is an initiative built around a shift in the world of computing. For nearly 60 years, companies that needed computing resources had to build data centres, buy servers, hire technical talent to manage all of it, and then continually reinvest to keep up with technology. Further, many businesses were often forced to deploy, scale, patch, maintain, backup and then monitor the hardware themselves 24x7x365.
Today, Rackspace delivers fully managed computing-as-a-service instead. Computing service, whether managed hosting, cloud computing or e-mail hosting, gives IT teams the freedom to instantaneously turn on the computing resources that are needed and turn off resources that are not needed. Businesses pay for only what they use, which allows them to avoid massive long-term capital investments that can quickly become outdated. The expertise of IT departments can then be harnessed to focus on strategic business innovation, rather than managing hardware. For more information, visit http://www.rackspace.com/NoMoreServers.
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