Cloud will not hit internal data centre spending says Ovum

In its "2013 Trends to Watch: Data Centre Technology" report, the analyst says firms will focus more on data centre cost-savings, and more efficient internal IT delivery methods such as virtualisation and software-defined networks (SDNs).

The report says, "The hype surrounding cloud computing can lead some organisations to predict the end of the internal data centre. For many organisations however the question of workload classification remains a difficult issue, and the default position is to keep it on-premise.

"But even if the workloads are fully understood in terms of risk, cost and value, the ability to move them is the Achilles heel of current technologies."

Ovum analyst Roy Illsley said, "This scenario is highly unlikely to change unless workloads between cloud technologies become truly portable in 2013, or security and privacy concerns evaporate."

Other trends to watch in 2013, says Ovum, will be the "complete virtualisation of all layers in the data centre from the database, to the storage, out to the user", which will also "drive the need for greater automation technologies".