(11 December 2014) – According to a survey conducted by Eurostat at the beginning of 2014 on ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) usage in enterprises, 81% of the enterprises do not use the “cloud”. The insufficient knowledge of cloud computing is considered as the main blocking factor.
Instead of building their own IT infrastructure, enterprises have the possibility to access computing resources hosted by third parties on the internet. This shared pool of resources is most commonly known as “cloud computing”.
Although the share of firms with internet access was at very similar high levels across Member States, only a fifth (19%) used cloud computing services in 2014.
Not surprisingly, the largest proportion of enterprises in the EU28 using the cloud was by far recorded in the information & communication sector (45%), followed by the sector covering professional, scientific and technical activities (27%), while the share ranged from 14% to 20% in all other economic sectors.
Enterprises relied on a cloud solution mainly for their e-mail services (66%) and for file storage (53%). Those enterprises using cloud services reported that the risk of a security breach was the main factor limiting a larger use of the cloud.