With 60% of current IT budgets earmarked to support future business expansion and growth, digital transformations are starting to take root across Western Europe, according to a report.
The report, which was commissioned by Level 3 Communications Inc. (NYSE: LVLT) and conducted by IDG Connect , highlighted the biggest drivers for digital transformations across the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands and Belgium, which include reducing the cost of IT service delivery by optimizing legacy infrastructure (57%), support for greater product/service innovation (51%) and the need to improve customer experience and interaction (50%).
Out of the those IT budgets, the three biggest areas of digital transformation investment over the next 18 months were projected to be big data analytics for business development (61%), cloud migration (58%) and data security (57%), according to the IDG Connect report.
From the "glass is half empty" side of the report, the primary challenges for digital transformations were keeping up with the pace of digital change (64%), finding the right partners (63%) and implementing effective data security (62%).
For the report, IDG Connect surveyed 274 senior staff members who worked for organizations that were headquartered in the five countries to assess their plans for digital transformation over the next two years. Close to a third (30%) of those surveyed worked in board-level positions such as chief information officers, chief technology officers, chief security officers and chief digital officers. The same number identified themselves as IT managers while 22% were IT directors.
— Mike Robuck, Editor, Telco Transformation