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Splunk 2016 Predictions: Every Enterprise Will Have a Cloud Strategy

Virtualization and Cloud executives share their predictions for 2016. Read them in this 8th Annual VMblog.com series exclusive.

Contributed by Marc Olesen, SVP and GM of cloud solutions, Splunk

Every Enterprise Will Have a Cloud Strategy

In years prior, we've seen a lot of skepticism around the use of cloud in the enterprise, especially as it relates to security. However, as cloud services continue improving their security posture and enterprises need a scalable solution that matches their business model, we'll see cloud adoption take off in 2016.

Instead of cloud adoption being driven by scale and innovation, I believe we'll start to see this shift take place due to outlying market trends - such as the Internet of Things (IoT), the time to value and full potential of systems such as Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), and the availability of engineering expertise for cloud platforms.

Cloud will become the de facto platform for the IoT.

Implications of the IoT to the enterprise are vast and still largely uncertain. However, as we start to see an increase in connected devices - with everything from the printer to the sprinkler system in an office - organizations will have to store data aggregated from these devices in addition to monitoring and analyzing them. As organizations increasingly bring IoT devices into the enterprise, cloud will be the de facto platform for collecting and analyzing data generated by these IoT devices to ensure uptime and performance.

SIEM will move to the cloud.

As cloud options continue to improve, enterprise-scale solutions will be delivered from the cloud for increased agility and functionality. One solution we'll see transition to the cloud is SIEM. Enterprises looking to gain the features and functionality delivered by SIEM solutions will increasingly look to cloud services. This shift will be driven by flexibility and time to value. We might see noticeable gains in hybrid SIEMs as well, for those organizations not yet ready to fully embrace the cloud.

Engineering talent will drive cloud platform growth.

People stick with what they know. Once engineers are trained on various programs, they develop preferences. And this will be no different with cloud platforms. As organizations continue to leverage cloud, the cloud platform they choose will become increasingly dependent on the availability of engineering talent around that platform.

About the Author

Marc Olesen has been with Splunk since 2014 and currently serves as the senior vice president and general manager of cloud solutions. Prior to joining Splunk, Mr. Olesen served as president and CEO of Averail, a provider of cloud-based, secure mobile content solutions, which was acquired by MobileIron. From 2009 to 2012, Mr. Olesen served as senior vice president and general manager at McAfee. Prior to McAfee, Mr. Olesen was vice president, software as a service, at Mercury Interactive from 2003 to 2006 and at HP from 2007 to 2009 following HP's acquisition of Mercury. Previously, Mr. Olesen held a variety of executive leadership positions at DNAnexus, Qwest CyberSolutions, BearingPoint, Remedy and Oracle. Mr. Olesen holds A.B. and M.S. degrees from Stanford University.