A majority (58 per cent) of IT managers of logistics organisations use cloud technology. However, the added value of this technology is still unclear to many. Besides cloud, business intelligence and analytics are mentioned as important technologies. This is according to research by Motion10, among fifty-five it managers.
For application integration, 60 per cent opt for on-premise and 24 per cent for the cloud, for collaboration portals the ratio is 49 versus 35 per cent and for business intelligence, 44 per cent opt for on-premise and 17 per cent for the cloud. So the majority opt for an on-premise solution. According to those surveyed, the reason for choosing on-premise is that they are part of smaller companies that are less likely to prefer cloud technology. According to them, there must first be a significant scale that creates room to start developments on their own that move the company forward.
Gijs in 't Veld, cto of Motion 10, adds: 'A preference for on-premise may be caused by the fact that logistics organisations prefer to keep the it solutions that are business-critical as close to them as possible, and want to take as little risk with them as possible. So logistics companies do use applications in the cloud, but these are applications that are less critical to the business, such as Microsoft Office 365. Another reason why companies may be reluctant when it comes to the cloud is security. Large amounts of sensitive or confidential data may be stored in the cloud, and thus companies may have doubts about how secure that data is in the cloud.'
Business intelligence
Of those surveyed, 31 per cent prefer a self-service bi-solution that can be migrated to a managed bi-solution with a data warehouse in between, so that it happens in a controlled way. A third of IT managers choose a managed bi solution with a data warehouse in between so that their own IT department is 'in control'. A quarter choose a self-service bi solution so that the business can use it immediately. Some 44 per cent of respondents here prefer a bi solution running on-premise.
Remote and internet portals
Finally, respondents indicated that external customer or supplier portals are an important it topic within the organisation. These external portals are considered more important (42 per cent) than internet portals (20 per cent). Delving deeper into portals in the survey, 60 per cent indicated that 'information provision and collaboration with customers' is the main driver for the organisation to use external portals. Some 25 per cent cited 'collaboration and communication internally between colleagues', as the main reason for using portals. Further questions reveal that 62 per cent consider 'providing customers with real-time information' the most important aspect of portals, some 40 per cent additionally mention 'unlocking information from back-office systems to third parties.'
Motion10 is a partner of Microsoft. The company claims to be a specialist in the Netherlands in the field of BizTalk Server and the integration capabilities of the Azure platform. It also focuses on SharePoint Portals, document management, systems integration, office 365, Microsoft business intelligence, modern business apps and project and portfolio management. CTO Gijst in 't Veld is responsible for technical vision, innovation and strategy at Motion10.
This article appeared as part of trade fair ICT&Logistics at Computable
