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Gartner: Cloud Will Become a Business Necessity by 2028

Global Public Cloud Services Spending to Total $679 Billion in 2024

By 2028, cloud computing will shift from being a technology disruptor to becoming a necessary component for maintaining business competitiveness, according to Gartner, Inc.

IT spending on public cloud services continues to rise unabated. In 2024, worldwide end-user spending on public cloud services is forecast to total $679 billion and projected to exceed $1 trillion in 2027.

"Organizations are actively investing in cloud technology due to its potential to foster innovation, create market disruptions, and enhance customer retention in order to gain a competitive edge," said Milind Govekar, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner. "While many organizations have started to seize the technical advantages of cloud, only a few have unlocked its full potential in supporting business transformation. As a result, organizations are using the cloud to launch a new wave of disruption driven by artificial intelligence (AI), enabling them to unlock business value at scale."

The Role of Cloud in 2023

More than 50% of enterprises will use industry cloud platforms by 2028 to accelerate their business initiatives

Most companies currently consider the cloud as a technology platform. In 2023, organizations are using cloud computing either as a technology disruptor or capability enabler. Gartner predicts that more than 50% of enterprises will use industry cloud platforms by 2028 to accelerate their business initiatives. In 2028, most organizations will be leveraging cloud as a business necessity.

Organizations that are utilizing the cloud as a technology disruptor are harnessing its transformative potential to revolutionize non-cloud, data-center oriented computing styles and technologies.

"As businesses navigate through digital transformation journeys, movement to the cloud becomes a key decision point," said Govekar.

Companies that are adopting cloud technology as a capability enabler are using its potential to enable new capabilities such as elasticity, rapid continuous integration/cloud delivery (CI/CD), serverless functions and AI-infused APIs and processes that were difficult to achieve pre-cloud. To exploit these new capabilities, organizations must carefully evaluate factors such as their investment in skills development, breaking down operational silos, and promoting collaboration among teams to seamlessly adopt automation.

Cloud as a Business Necessity in 2028

Over the next few years, cloud computing will continue to evolve from being an innovation facilitator to a business disruptor and, ultimately, a business necessity.

With cloud computing as an innovation facilitator, organizations can distribute platform business concepts widely by using its underlying platform technology to provide interconnections, scale, aggregation and analysis capabilities, which allows the use of technology as a fundamental component of a business model.

"By leveraging the ecosystem of cloud providers, organizations can introduce innovative products and services, such as fraud prevention solutions for second-hand cars from tire manufacturers, or rapid vaccine development through cloud-based machine learning by pharmaceutical companies," said Govekar.

By 2028, most organizations will fully transform into digital entities capable of sensing and responding to business and market conditions. "With cloud computing becoming an integral part of business operations in 2028, CIOs and IT leaders will have to implement a highly efficient cloud operating model in order to achieve their desired business objectives," Govekar concluded.

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While companies adopt AI at a record pace, they also face the challenge of finding a smart and scalable way to manage its rapidly growing costs. This requires balancing the massive possibilities inherent in AI with the need to control cloud costs, aim for long-term profitability and optimize spending ...

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As businesses increasingly rely on high-performance applications to deliver seamless user experiences, the demand for fast, reliable, and scalable data storage systems has never been greater. Redis — an open-source, in-memory data structure store — has emerged as a popular choice for use cases ranging from caching to real-time analytics. But with great performance comes the need for vigilant monitoring ...

Kubernetes was not initially designed with AI's vast resource variability in mind, and the rapid rise of AI has exposed Kubernetes limitations, particularly when it comes to cost and resource efficiency. Indeed, AI workloads differ from traditional applications in that they require a staggering amount and variety of compute resources, and their consumption is far less consistent than traditional workloads ... Considering the speed of AI innovation, teams cannot afford to be bogged down by these constant infrastructure concerns. A solution is needed ...

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A Gartner analyst recently suggested that GenAI tools could create 25% time savings for network operational teams. Where might these time savings come from? How are GenAI tools helping NetOps teams today, and what other tasks might they take on in the future as models continue improving? In general, these savings come from automating or streamlining manual NetOps tasks ...

IT and line-of-business teams are increasingly aligned in their efforts to close the data gap and drive greater collaboration to alleviate IT bottlenecks and offload growing demands on IT teams, according to The 2025 Automation Benchmark Report: Insights from IT Leaders on Enterprise Automation & the Future of AI-Driven Businesses from Jitterbit ...

A large majority (86%) of data management and AI decision makers cite protecting data privacy as a top concern, with 76% of respondents citing ROI on data privacy and AI initiatives across their organization, according to a new Harris Poll from Collibra ...

According to Gartner, Inc. the following six trends will shape the future of cloud over the next four years, ultimately resulting in new ways of working that are digital in nature and transformative in impact ...

Gartner: Cloud Will Become a Business Necessity by 2028

Global Public Cloud Services Spending to Total $679 Billion in 2024

By 2028, cloud computing will shift from being a technology disruptor to becoming a necessary component for maintaining business competitiveness, according to Gartner, Inc.

IT spending on public cloud services continues to rise unabated. In 2024, worldwide end-user spending on public cloud services is forecast to total $679 billion and projected to exceed $1 trillion in 2027.

"Organizations are actively investing in cloud technology due to its potential to foster innovation, create market disruptions, and enhance customer retention in order to gain a competitive edge," said Milind Govekar, Distinguished VP Analyst at Gartner. "While many organizations have started to seize the technical advantages of cloud, only a few have unlocked its full potential in supporting business transformation. As a result, organizations are using the cloud to launch a new wave of disruption driven by artificial intelligence (AI), enabling them to unlock business value at scale."

The Role of Cloud in 2023

More than 50% of enterprises will use industry cloud platforms by 2028 to accelerate their business initiatives

Most companies currently consider the cloud as a technology platform. In 2023, organizations are using cloud computing either as a technology disruptor or capability enabler. Gartner predicts that more than 50% of enterprises will use industry cloud platforms by 2028 to accelerate their business initiatives. In 2028, most organizations will be leveraging cloud as a business necessity.

Organizations that are utilizing the cloud as a technology disruptor are harnessing its transformative potential to revolutionize non-cloud, data-center oriented computing styles and technologies.

"As businesses navigate through digital transformation journeys, movement to the cloud becomes a key decision point," said Govekar.

Companies that are adopting cloud technology as a capability enabler are using its potential to enable new capabilities such as elasticity, rapid continuous integration/cloud delivery (CI/CD), serverless functions and AI-infused APIs and processes that were difficult to achieve pre-cloud. To exploit these new capabilities, organizations must carefully evaluate factors such as their investment in skills development, breaking down operational silos, and promoting collaboration among teams to seamlessly adopt automation.

Cloud as a Business Necessity in 2028

Over the next few years, cloud computing will continue to evolve from being an innovation facilitator to a business disruptor and, ultimately, a business necessity.

With cloud computing as an innovation facilitator, organizations can distribute platform business concepts widely by using its underlying platform technology to provide interconnections, scale, aggregation and analysis capabilities, which allows the use of technology as a fundamental component of a business model.

"By leveraging the ecosystem of cloud providers, organizations can introduce innovative products and services, such as fraud prevention solutions for second-hand cars from tire manufacturers, or rapid vaccine development through cloud-based machine learning by pharmaceutical companies," said Govekar.

By 2028, most organizations will fully transform into digital entities capable of sensing and responding to business and market conditions. "With cloud computing becoming an integral part of business operations in 2028, CIOs and IT leaders will have to implement a highly efficient cloud operating model in order to achieve their desired business objectives," Govekar concluded.

Hot Topics

The Latest

While companies adopt AI at a record pace, they also face the challenge of finding a smart and scalable way to manage its rapidly growing costs. This requires balancing the massive possibilities inherent in AI with the need to control cloud costs, aim for long-term profitability and optimize spending ...

Telecommunications is expanding at an unprecedented pace ... But progress brings complexity. As WanAware's 2025 Telecom Observability Benchmark Report reveals, many operators are discovering that modernization requires more than physical build outs and CapEx — it also demands the tools and insights to manage, secure, and optimize this fast-growing infrastructure in real time ...

As businesses increasingly rely on high-performance applications to deliver seamless user experiences, the demand for fast, reliable, and scalable data storage systems has never been greater. Redis — an open-source, in-memory data structure store — has emerged as a popular choice for use cases ranging from caching to real-time analytics. But with great performance comes the need for vigilant monitoring ...

Kubernetes was not initially designed with AI's vast resource variability in mind, and the rapid rise of AI has exposed Kubernetes limitations, particularly when it comes to cost and resource efficiency. Indeed, AI workloads differ from traditional applications in that they require a staggering amount and variety of compute resources, and their consumption is far less consistent than traditional workloads ... Considering the speed of AI innovation, teams cannot afford to be bogged down by these constant infrastructure concerns. A solution is needed ...

AI is the catalyst for significant investment in data teams as enterprises require higher-quality data to power their AI applications, according to the State of Analytics Engineering Report from dbt Labs ...

Misaligned architecture can lead to business consequences, with 93% of respondents reporting negative outcomes such as service disruptions, high operational costs and security challenges ...

A Gartner analyst recently suggested that GenAI tools could create 25% time savings for network operational teams. Where might these time savings come from? How are GenAI tools helping NetOps teams today, and what other tasks might they take on in the future as models continue improving? In general, these savings come from automating or streamlining manual NetOps tasks ...

IT and line-of-business teams are increasingly aligned in their efforts to close the data gap and drive greater collaboration to alleviate IT bottlenecks and offload growing demands on IT teams, according to The 2025 Automation Benchmark Report: Insights from IT Leaders on Enterprise Automation & the Future of AI-Driven Businesses from Jitterbit ...

A large majority (86%) of data management and AI decision makers cite protecting data privacy as a top concern, with 76% of respondents citing ROI on data privacy and AI initiatives across their organization, according to a new Harris Poll from Collibra ...

According to Gartner, Inc. the following six trends will shape the future of cloud over the next four years, ultimately resulting in new ways of working that are digital in nature and transformative in impact ...