Five Trends in Cloud Adoption for 2023

What’s the most important technology of 2023? According to hundreds of CTOs and IT leaders, it’s cloud computing.

The research tends to agree. Gartner predicts that worldwide end-user spending on public cloud services will grow 20.7% to total $591.8 billion in 2023, up from $490.3 billion in 2022.

Other analysis finds that 50% of all business workloads are expected to run in the cloud by 2023, up from 40% in 2021. At the same time, the budget for moving to the cloud has increased significantly, accounting for 26% of all IT spending in 2022.

In light of the continued growth of the cloud, we’re taking a look at the upcoming trends. What’s the cloud adoption landscape going to look like in the coming months? Read on to find out.

New trends in 2023 cloud usage

Although Business Wire reports that hardware still accounts for the majority of IT budgets in 2022, the trends indicate that cloud services are continuing to grow rapidly. One prediction suggests that the cloud computing market will surpass $1 trillion by 2028.

“The pandemic has been the biggest single accelerant to cloud adoption that we’ve ever seen,” explains Dion Hinchcliffe, VP and principal analyst at the tech advisory firm Constellation Research, in a Harvard Business Review article. The rise in remote work and the need to embrace flexible, scalable services are among the major factors driving this acceleration — even in the face of a possible recession.

“Cloud computing will continue to be a bastion of safety and innovation, supporting growth during uncertain times due to its agile, elastic and scalable nature,” explained Sid Nag, Vice President Analyst at Gartner. “Cloud migration is not stopping.”

But the cloud of the future doesn’t necessarily resemble the cloud of the past — even the recent past. With new advancements in AI, automation, security, and more, the cloud is changing rapidly to keep up with the demands of our times. Here are five of the most significant trends.

1. The rise of industry cloud platforms

One of the most exciting trends of 2023 is the rise of industry cloud platforms (ICPs). These platforms combine traditional cloud services with tailored SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS offerings for vertical industry use cases. As opposed to a one-size-fits-all cloud solution, ICPs offer industry-specific functionalities to tackle unique challenges.

ICPs provide flexibility, modularity, and composability, helping companies grow rapidly and accelerate their time to value. They can also be designed to support compliance with particular industry requirements. Their key value is in offering industry players a more agile way to manage workloads in the face of their particular operational and regulatory needs.

ICPs are already in use in the healthcare industry, where they’re commonly called digital health platforms. Gartner predicts that banks, retailers, and manufacturers will all begin to launch their own ICPs soon, likely in partnership with existing cloud service providers.

2. AI and machine learning

Lately, the rise of artificial intelligence has been dominating the news. Although it’s still an emerging technology, AI has been seen generating art, writing chatbot responses, making crop planting schedules, fighting credit card fraud, and even driving cars and performing medical procedures in 2023.

We’re only seeing the very beginning of the massive changes that AI will bring, but companies are already taking note. Forrester’s 2022 Data and Analytics Survey predicts that 10% of Fortune 500 enterprises will generate content with AI tools in 2023, while IDC states that worldwide spending by governments and businesses on AI technology will top $500 billion in 2023.

This rapid growth will be possible because of the cloud, which offers more cost-effective options for storing the large datasets needed to train AI models. But AI is also expected to improve the experience of the cloud, making cloud data processing and management much more accurate and efficient.

3. Kubernetes (K8s) investments

Kubernetes, also known as K8s, is an open-source platform maintained by the Cloud Native Computing Foundation. It allows organizations to automate their application building, deployment, scaling, and management processes in the cloud.

According to a 2022 cloud survey by Forrester, organizations will be accelerating their K8s investments for both current applications and new workloads this year. That’s largely because Kubernetes offers tools for a range of technology domains, including AI, machine learning, blockchain, data management, the Internet of Things (IoT), 5G, and more.

Kubernetes is not without its challenges — K8s clusters are not secure by default, the platform is notoriously complex, and skilled engineers can be difficult to find — but its ability to help organizations scale at lightning speeds is making it an important part of the 2023 cloud adoption landscape.

4. Stronger security and resilience

One of the biggest upcoming trends in cloud computing is a stronger focus on data security and resilience. According to Gartner, worldwide end user spending on cloud management and security services will reach $41.7 billion in 2023, up from $28.5 billion just two years ago.

The demand for more robust security measures has already led to a rise in practices like virtual private networks (VPNs), multi-factor authentication (MFA), and bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policies in workplaces. In 2023, we’ll also see the expansion of tools and platforms that work more holistically to protect cloud-based data.

Additionally, companies will be shifting to acknowledge the human element in cloud data security. We’re beginning to see a larger emphasis on phishing training, human error, and cybersecurity exercises (CSx) to raise organizational awareness.

Lastly, companies will redouble their focus on building more resilient cloud infrastructures that can withstand cyberattacks and data breaches in 2023. While some will continue to rely on cloud service providers to offer redundancy and failover capabilities for high availability, others will adopt outside solutions to ensure their business can continue to operate smoothly and securely in the cloud.

5. Exploring a multi-cloud future

This year, multi-cloud infrastructures will become an increasingly popular choice for businesses. Rather than relying on a single cloud provider, businesses will opt for a combination of public and private clouds to achieve better flexibility, resilience, and cost savings.

According to Gartner research, multi-cloud infrastructure is already most prevalent in organizations that embrace dynamic, rapid change. This kind of infrastructure enables businesses to distribute their workloads across different clouds and to take advantage of the unique strengths of each cloud provider.

As multi-cloud infrastructures grow in popularity, businesses will also need to adopt new security solutions to ensure that their data and applications are adequately protected across their different clouds.

Embracing the cloud in 2023 with ShardSecure

ShardSecure provides advanced data privacy, security, and resilience in multi-cloud and hybrid-cloud environments. With the help of our holistic data control platform, companies can take advantage of all the latest developments in cloud technology while still protecting their data from unauthorized access.

With an easy, transparent integration, we make it simple to migrate data among storage locations as your company scales. We also neutralize ransomware, maintain high availability, and support compliance with cross-border data regulations.

Let ShardSecure help you embrace the flexibility and cost savings of the cloud while strengthening your data security and resilience. For more information, visit our resources page.