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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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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The 5 Pillars of Cross-Platform Observability

Traditional monitoring often stops at uptime and server health without any integrated insights. Cross-platform observability covers not just infrastructure telemetry but also client-side behavior, distributed service interactions, and the contextual data that connects them. Emerging technologies like OpenTelemetry, eBPF, and AI-driven anomaly detection have made this vision more achievable, but only if organizations ground their observability strategy in well-defined pillars. Here are the five foundational pillars of cross-platform observability that modern engineering teams should focus on for seamless platform performance ...

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For all the attention AI receives in corporate slide decks and strategic roadmaps, many businesses are struggling to translate that ambition into something that holds up at scale. At least, that's the picture that emerged from a recent Forrester study commissioned by Tines ...

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From smart factories and autonomous vehicles to real-time analytics and intelligent building systems, the demand for instant, local data processing is exploding. To meet these needs, organizations are leaning into edge computing. The promise? Faster performance, reduced latency and less strain on centralized infrastructure. But there's a catch: Not every network is ready to support edge deployments ...

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Every digital customer interaction, every cloud deployment, and every AI model depends on the same foundation: the ability to see, understand, and act on data in real time ... Recent data from Splunk confirms that 74% of the business leaders believe observability is essential to monitoring critical business processes, and 66% feel it's key to understanding user journeys. Because while the unknown is inevitable, observability makes it manageable. Let's explore why ...

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