IT Downtime Increases During Pandemic

Learn more about LogicMonitor

IT downtime, which includes both brownouts and outages, has increased during the pandemic, according to a study by LogicMonitor.

In addition, the study found that previously siloed IT teams and technologies are converging as enterprises accelerate their modernization efforts in reaction to COVID-19. The responsibilities of CIOs are expanding and the roles of traditional IT operations and administration teams are moving closer and closer to those of agile application developers and quality and security engineers as business priorities shift to align with the customer and their digital experience.

The study findings include:

■ 79% of global CIOs and CTOs feel that their input and importance within the boardroom has increased in the last 12 months (86% of CIOs/CTOs based in North America feel that way; 78% based in EMEA; 74% based in APAC).

■ The vast majority of global enterprises (93%) have seen some level of convergence between traditional IT operations and administration teams and development teams in the last 12 months.

■ 94% of those respondents credit the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic with accelerating this convergence.

■ 21% of global IT leaders believe that improved security will be the top benefit resulting from convergence between ITOps and DevOps; followed by greater ability to scale (16%); better cross-org collaboration/alignment (14%); reduction in outages/brownouts (12%); and better customer experience (11%).

"One of the key benefits of the convergence between ITOps and DevOps is that such a synergy makes it increasingly feasible to achieve true unified IT observability within modern enterprises," said Christina Kosmowski, President of LogicMonitor. "As our research shows, observability is all about gaining full visibility into the health, performance and availability of an organization’s IT stack. Companies who achieve unified observability will find it far easier to complete their digital transformation initiatives and succeed in today’s digital economy ...”

Enterprises Prioritize Data Security, Cloud and IT Automation in Today's Era of Remote Work

Many IT leaders are changing the way they invest in various IT initiatives as digital transformation accelerates due to COVID-19 and the rise of remote work.

■ In 2020, 73% of global IT leaders substantially increased their investments in data security; 71% substantially increased their investments in cloud technologies and services, and 68% substantially increased their investments in IT automation.

■ In 2020, 17% of global enterprises decreased their investments in on-premises technologies.

■ 11% of global enterprises say that expanding use of the cloud is their number one priority in 2021.

■ 75% of global IT leaders plan to increase investment in both data security and cloud technologies and services in the next 12-24 months; 71% of global IT leaders plan to increase investment in IT automation in the next 12-24 months.

IT Outages and Brownouts Remain Widespread

One negative IT trend that global businesses continue to experience at alarming rates — despite the severe negative business impact — is IT downtime, which includes both brownouts and outages. Global IT leaders identify remote work, the Internet of Things (IoT) and migration to the cloud as the top three trends contributing to widespread downtime, although respondents based in EMEA mention mobile computing as a key contributor, and respondents in APAC mention edge computing as a key contributor.


■ In the past three years, 97% of global IT leaders said their organization had experienced an IT brownout; 94% said their organization had experienced an outage.

■ 51% of IT leaders said they had seen an increase in IT downtime as a result of the pandemic since March 2020.

■ Respondents in North America were more likely to see an increase in downtime since the pandemic began (57%), compared to Europe (50%) and APAC (48%).

■ 7% of IT leaders admit to experiencing 50 or more brownouts and 50 or more outages in the last three years.

■ Enterprises experience an average of 15 IT outages every 3 years and 19 brownouts.

■ Lost productivity tops the list as the most negative impact IT leaders have experienced as a result of IT brownouts (66%) and outages (61%), followed by lost revenue (43% for brownouts and 42% for outages) and damage to brand/reputation (31% for brownouts and 32% for outages).

■ 16% of IT leaders say their organization was shut down permanently as a result of IT outages during the past three years.

As the world continues the rapid pace of digital transformation — made even more imperative by the ongoing pandemic — organizations cannot afford to experience downtime. By embracing the technologies that provide them with full observability into their IT infrastructure, organizations can mitigate the risk of downtime and quickly resolve issues when they do occur.

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IT Downtime Increases During Pandemic

Learn more about LogicMonitor

IT downtime, which includes both brownouts and outages, has increased during the pandemic, according to a study by LogicMonitor.

In addition, the study found that previously siloed IT teams and technologies are converging as enterprises accelerate their modernization efforts in reaction to COVID-19. The responsibilities of CIOs are expanding and the roles of traditional IT operations and administration teams are moving closer and closer to those of agile application developers and quality and security engineers as business priorities shift to align with the customer and their digital experience.

The study findings include:

■ 79% of global CIOs and CTOs feel that their input and importance within the boardroom has increased in the last 12 months (86% of CIOs/CTOs based in North America feel that way; 78% based in EMEA; 74% based in APAC).

■ The vast majority of global enterprises (93%) have seen some level of convergence between traditional IT operations and administration teams and development teams in the last 12 months.

■ 94% of those respondents credit the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic with accelerating this convergence.

■ 21% of global IT leaders believe that improved security will be the top benefit resulting from convergence between ITOps and DevOps; followed by greater ability to scale (16%); better cross-org collaboration/alignment (14%); reduction in outages/brownouts (12%); and better customer experience (11%).

"One of the key benefits of the convergence between ITOps and DevOps is that such a synergy makes it increasingly feasible to achieve true unified IT observability within modern enterprises," said Christina Kosmowski, President of LogicMonitor. "As our research shows, observability is all about gaining full visibility into the health, performance and availability of an organization’s IT stack. Companies who achieve unified observability will find it far easier to complete their digital transformation initiatives and succeed in today’s digital economy ...”

Enterprises Prioritize Data Security, Cloud and IT Automation in Today's Era of Remote Work

Many IT leaders are changing the way they invest in various IT initiatives as digital transformation accelerates due to COVID-19 and the rise of remote work.

■ In 2020, 73% of global IT leaders substantially increased their investments in data security; 71% substantially increased their investments in cloud technologies and services, and 68% substantially increased their investments in IT automation.

■ In 2020, 17% of global enterprises decreased their investments in on-premises technologies.

■ 11% of global enterprises say that expanding use of the cloud is their number one priority in 2021.

■ 75% of global IT leaders plan to increase investment in both data security and cloud technologies and services in the next 12-24 months; 71% of global IT leaders plan to increase investment in IT automation in the next 12-24 months.

IT Outages and Brownouts Remain Widespread

One negative IT trend that global businesses continue to experience at alarming rates — despite the severe negative business impact — is IT downtime, which includes both brownouts and outages. Global IT leaders identify remote work, the Internet of Things (IoT) and migration to the cloud as the top three trends contributing to widespread downtime, although respondents based in EMEA mention mobile computing as a key contributor, and respondents in APAC mention edge computing as a key contributor.


■ In the past three years, 97% of global IT leaders said their organization had experienced an IT brownout; 94% said their organization had experienced an outage.

■ 51% of IT leaders said they had seen an increase in IT downtime as a result of the pandemic since March 2020.

■ Respondents in North America were more likely to see an increase in downtime since the pandemic began (57%), compared to Europe (50%) and APAC (48%).

■ 7% of IT leaders admit to experiencing 50 or more brownouts and 50 or more outages in the last three years.

■ Enterprises experience an average of 15 IT outages every 3 years and 19 brownouts.

■ Lost productivity tops the list as the most negative impact IT leaders have experienced as a result of IT brownouts (66%) and outages (61%), followed by lost revenue (43% for brownouts and 42% for outages) and damage to brand/reputation (31% for brownouts and 32% for outages).

■ 16% of IT leaders say their organization was shut down permanently as a result of IT outages during the past three years.

As the world continues the rapid pace of digital transformation — made even more imperative by the ongoing pandemic — organizations cannot afford to experience downtime. By embracing the technologies that provide them with full observability into their IT infrastructure, organizations can mitigate the risk of downtime and quickly resolve issues when they do occur.

Hot Topics

The Latest

6 Signals That an Architectural Shift Is Underway Across Enterprise Networks

A major architectural shift is underway across enterprise networks, according to a new global study from Cisco. As AI assistants, agents, and data-driven workloads reshape how work gets done, they're creating faster, more dynamic, more latency-sensitive, and more complex network traffic. Combined with the ubiquity of connected devices, 24/7 uptime demands, and intensifying security threats, these shifts are driving infrastructure to adapt and evolve ...

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Is Better Release Management the Solution to the Persistent Banking App Downtime?

The development of banking apps was supposed to provide users with convenience, control and piece of mind. However, for thousands of Halifax customers recently, a major mobile outage caused the exact opposite, leaving customers unable to check balances, or pay bills, sparking widespread frustration. This wasn't an isolated incident ... So why are these failures still happening? ...

Understanding Zero-Day Vulnerabilities: Why They Matter and How to Stay Protected

Cyber threats are growing more sophisticated every day, and at their forefront are zero-day vulnerabilities. These elusive security gaps are exploited before a fix becomes available, making them among the most dangerous threats in today's digital landscape ... This guide will explore what these vulnerabilities are, how they work, why they pose such a significant threat, and how modern organizations can stay protected ...

Data Center Outages Becoming Less Frequent

The prevention of data center outages continues to be a strategic priority for data center owners and operators. Infrastructure equipment has improved, but the complexity of modern architectures and evolving external threats presents new risks that operators must actively manage, according to the Data Center Outage Analysis 2025 from Uptime Institute ...

Instrumentation Score: Quantifying Telemetry Quality

As observability engineers, we navigate a sea of telemetry daily. We instrument our applications, configure collectors, and build dashboards, all in pursuit of understanding our complex distributed systems. Yet, amidst this flood of data, a critical question often remains unspoken, or at best, answered by gut feeling: "Is our telemetry actually good?" ... We're inviting you to participate in shaping a foundational element for better observability: the Instrumentation Score ...

Automating While Keeping Humans in the Loop

We're inching ever closer toward a long-held goal: technology infrastructure that is so automated that it can protect itself. But as IT leaders aggressively employ automation across our enterprises, we need to continuously reassess what AI is ready to manage autonomously and what can not yet be trusted to algorithms ...

AI Factories: Scaling Intelligence with Observability, Reliability and Efficiency

Much like a traditional factory turns raw materials into finished products, the AI factory turns vast datasets into actionable business outcomes through advanced models, inferences, and automation. From the earliest data inputs to the final token output, this process must be reliable, repeatable, and scalable. That requires industrializing the way AI is developed, deployed, and managed ...

Think You've Heard Everything About the Debate over RTO? Here's the Big Thing Leaders Are Missing

Almost half (48%) of employees admit they resent their jobs but stay anyway, according to research from Ivanti ... This has obvious consequences across the business, but we're overlooking the massive impact of resenteeism and presenteeism on IT. For IT professionals tasked with managing the backbone of modern business operations, these numbers spell big trouble ...

Beyond the MACH Hype: Why Your Commerce Platform Is Not Helping You Win DX or CX

For many B2B and B2C enterprise brands, technology isn't a core strength. Relying on overly complex architectures (like those that follow a pure MACH doctrine) has been flagged by industry leaders as a source of operational slowdown, creating bottlenecks that limit agility in volatile market conditions ...

Effective FinOps: Moving from Recommendations to Risks

FinOps champions crucial cross-departmental collaboration, uniting business, finance, technology and engineering leaders to demystify cloud expenses. Yet, too often, critical cost issues are softened into mere "recommendations" or "insights" — easy to ignore. But what if we adopted security's battle-tested strategy and reframed these as the urgent risks they truly are, demanding immediate action? ...