Cloud Computing Use Increases With Improving EconomyCloud Computing Use Increases With Improving Economy

Server revenue for private cloud computing will grow to $11.8 billion in 2014 from $7.3 billion in 2009, IDC predicted in a report released Monday. The much smaller public cloud market is also expected to grow significantly, rising to $718 million from $582 million during the same timeframe.

With many IT vendors heading to serve the growing cloud-computing market, IDC analyst Katherine Broderick said it's a "great time for many IT organizations to begin seriously considering this technology and employing public and private clouds in order to simplify sprawling IT environments.

IDC defines a public cloud as being open to a largely unrestricted number of potential users within a market, as opposed to a single enterprise. On the other hand, access to private clouds is restricted to a single enterprise and is an internal shared resource, not a commercial offering.

Other findings in the IDC report are that public clouds are less likely to be broadly adopted than private clouds and the public variety will be less enterprise focused than the private models. In addition, 44% of the IT managers surveyed for the IDC report said they are considering private clouds in delivering Internet-based services.

One of the reasons public clouds are growing slower than private clouds is distrust on the part of consumers. A March survey of online adults found that from 55% to 69% of the respondents would be only somewhat or not at all interested in using cloud computing for pictures, music, office documents, videos, or financial services, such as tax files or bank records, Harris Interactive said.

Security was one of the main reasons for distrusting public clouds. Four in five of the respondents agreed that security was a concern. Only a quarter said they would trust a cloud-computing service for files with personal information, while three in five said they would not.