Cloud-based mobile applications to grow, claims report

Posted by Paul Sells

Revenues from cloud-based mobile applications are expected to reach almost $9.5 billion (£5.89 billion) by 2014, a new report has claimed.

A study carried out by Juniper Research told IT outsourcing users that widespread adoption of mobile broadband services, the need for converged services and deployment of technological enablers such as HTML5 will drive the use of the applications.

The research suggested that enterprise applications will make most of the revenues expected to be seen over the next five years, as firms becoming increasingly interested in attaining the cost-saving benefits the cloud can deliver.

However, the report also said firms should bear data security issues in mind when using cloud-based mobile applications and ensure that they use reputable providers.

"Not only is it imperative for cloud providers to ensure that access to and storage of customer data is secure, but that the procedures that they put in place in this regard – including data backup strategies – are transparent to the customer," added study author Dr Windsor Holden.

Recent research by CIO Connect claimed that chief information officers seem split over the extent that IT will be affected by the rise of cloud computing, as 40 per cent think its impact will be significant while a fifth disagree.