Helping the business cut costs and boost revenues is still the primary focus of CIOs in Hong Kong, according to research conducted by Workday, Forrester Research and ServiceNow.
The research shows that Hong Kong CIOs are still primarily focused on operational priorities, even more so than their counterparts in Singapore. For example, 79% of Hong Kong CIOs prioritize reducing costs and/or improving operational efficiency versus 72% in Singapore.
Hong Kong CIOs’ struggle to transform IT operations is reflected in business leaders’ perception of IT. While business leaders (73%) view IT as a source of innovation for the organization, business units often go around IT in order to source technology or business applications directly (64%).
To meet their priorities, the majority of Hong Kong respondents are adopting cloud computing, but not as quickly as their Singapore counterparts. For example, 6% of Hong Kong respondents have fully adopted cloud computing and made it part of their core IT philosophy versus 16% in Singapore. Forty-two percent of Hong Kong respondents are aware of cloud computing but have no plans to adopt it, compared to 34% in Singapore.
Cloud adoption set to increase
The report also states that cloud adoption is expected to increase as a result of ongoing IT challenges. For example, 76% of Hong Kong respondents are struggling to adapt to the accelerating rate of technology change. Hong Kong CIOs are also faced with insufficient IT budget (61%), staffing problems (58%), and reconciling the differing priorities between IT and the business (55%).
The top CIO cloud concerns in Hong Kong center on SLAs, security and performance. A wide majority (85%) of Hong Kong respondents have concerns over their confidence in service levels of cloud providers – versus only 69% in Singapore. Other concerns aired include performance of the cloud service (76%); integrating cloud services with on-premises applications (76%); and data sovereignty / residency / security (73%).
While evaluating new technologies or applications - Hong Kong CIOs prefer solutions that are secure (91%), quick, easy to implement (85%), systematically updated (79%), and available with lower upfront cost to business (79%).
“Cloud solutions and services enable employees to work anytime, anywhere from a multitude of different devices,” Workday president for APAC and EMEA Chano Fernandez said.
“Streamlined interfaces and always-available data have resulted in a new way of working that is driving a more innovative work culture and more agile business models among many companies in Hong Kong and the region.”
CFO Innovation