The data center outsourcing industry across the Nordics remains strong despite lingering impacts of COVID, the fallout from the conflict in Ukraine and the resulting spike in energy costs, according to a new research report published today by Information Services Group a leading global technology research and advisory firm.
CIO INFLUENCE: Nextira Selected by Ansys Technology Partner Program to Support Customers Implementing Ansys Gateway Powered by AWS
“Even so, the IT market in the Nordics continues to show brisk growth.”
The 2023 ISG Provider Lens Private/Hybrid Cloud — Data Center Services report for the Nordics finds the current surge in operating costs is likely to be temporary and, over the long term, those costs will continue to fall. To that end, service providers in the Nordics are automating several IT operations to blunt the current high cost of labor.
“There’s no question the COVID-19 pandemic and the conflict between the Ukraine and Russia have caused some economic difficulties,” said Ola Chowning, ISG partner, North Europe. “Even so, the IT market in the Nordics continues to show brisk growth.”
Compared with other regions, the data center outsourcing industry in the Nordics is highly evolved. The countries in the region have a robust IT infrastructure, characterized by high-speed broadband internet penetration, the ISG report says. Most enterprises across the Nordics operate in a complex, hybrid and multicloud environment.
According to the ISG report, leading service providers have developed a robust suite of tools that include AIOps and infrastructure-as-code (IaC), along with a repository of automation blueprints. As a consequence of recent cyber intrusions and attacks, cybersecurity and data privacy rank high on the list of priorities for the Nordic nations, ISG says.
To address data and security concerns and to mitigate the rise in costs, some Nordic enterprises are adopting technologies from niche companies, the ISG report says. Despite the rise of these smaller, more narrowly focused companies, well-established service providers still dominate in the region. Enterprises across the Nordics, with their complex, sophisticated networks that operate across multicloud environments, will continue to rely on providers that are known quantities in this space and that have the backing of key hyperscalers, ISG says.
“Nordic enterprises require scalable hosting solutions that provide stringent data security and privacy,” said Jan Erik Aase, partner and global leader, ISG Provider Lens Research. “Service providers are leveraging their partnerships with ISVs (independent software vendors) and hyperscalers to build agile cloud environments that can meet these needs and still deliver high-performance computing.”
CIO INFLUENCE: CIO Influence Interview with Pete Lilley, Vice President and GM at Instaclustr
The report also examines how the proliferation of industry-specific IoT technologies and 5G will drive demand for a distributed edge computing infrastructure.
The 2023 ISG Provider Lens™ Private/Hybrid Cloud — Data Center Services report for the Nordics evaluates the capabilities of 52 providers across four quadrants: Managed Services for Large Accounts, Managed Services for Midmarket, Managed Hosting and Colocation Services.
The report names Orange Business as a Leader in all four quadrants, while ATEA, CGI and Tietoevry are named as Leaders in three quadrants each. Fujitsu, Kyndryl and T-Systems are named as Leaders in two quadrants each, while Accenture, Bulk Infrastructure, Capgemini, Digital Realty, EcoDataCenter, Equinix, Green Mountain, HCLTech, LTIMindtree, Sopra Steria, Stack Infrastructure, TCS, Tech Mahindra, Verne Global (Ficolo) and Wipro are named as Leaders in one quadrant each.
In addition, DXC Technology is named as a Rising Star — a company with a “promising portfolio” and “high future potential” by ISG’s definition — in two quadrants.
CIO INFLUENCE: JFrog Software Supply Chain Platform Delivers 393% ROI According to Total Economic Impact Study
[To share your insights with us, please write to sghosh@martechseries.com]
