A new whitepaper has detailed market analysis of attitudes towards cloud adoption and purchasing behaviours behind hosted physical security from 1000 IT decision makers from across Europe.

The in-depth survey, undertaken by Morphean, a provider of hosted security solutions, illustrates a market that has overcome initial concerns about cyber-security, has understood the clear benefits and will be seeking to adopt such solutions at pace in 2020.

The independent survey of key decision makers within companies from UK, France and Germany with more than 50 employees clearly shows better security, cost benefit and better functionality to be the most influential factors and the most commonly realised benefits of hosted security solutions including video surveillance as-a-service (VSaaS) and access control as-a-service (ACaaS). These solutions are part of a cloud security market that is expected to grow from USD 4.1 billion in 2017 to USD 12.7 billion by 2022, at a CAGR of 25.5%.

The ‘2019 Landscape Report: Hosted Security adoption in Europe’ is the second study of its kind by Morphean, and facilitates a better understanding of market trends with comparative data from 2018. It revealed that 84% of IT managers are currently using (48%) or considering using (36%) a hosted security solution, which is broadly consistent with the 89% who said they would consider such a solution last year. It also shows that better security ranked #3 among the main benefits realised by the cloud (44%) compared to 27% in 2018; representing a 63% increase in the year and shift in perception around cyber security concerns.

2019 key survey findings include:

• Better security, cost benefit and better functionality are viewed as the most influential factors AND the most commonly realized benefits of hosted security solutions 
• Half of respondents cited better security as the #1 benefit of using VSaaS / ACaaS; better functionality (42%) and cost benefits (38%) placed #2 and #3 respectively
• Half of IT managers have identified data / information security as a priority for improvement in the next 12 months
• 84% of IT managers are currently using (48%) or considering using (36%) a cloud-based video surveillance or access control solution
• Of those still considering VSaaS and ACaaS, 79% anticipate introducing these solutions to their business within 12 months
• 77% of IT managers report that physical security is not optimized; 20% have identified physical security as a priority for improvement in the next 12 months

Rodrigue Zbinden, CEO, Morphean, said: “Our research clearly points to a market that is overcoming initial concerns about cybersecurity, understands the clear benefits of hosted services and reflects growing confidence and purchase intent for 2020. The increased appetite for hosted security presents an opportunity for us to work with businesses to help them improve their physical security, while also educating them on the potential business intelligence benefits offered by surveillance and access control solutions when integrated in the cloud.”

The growing confidence in cloud seems to translate into more positive purchasing intentions around hosted security solutions with 77% of IT managers reporting that physical security is not currently optimized and one in five identifying it as a priority for 2020. Of those considering hosted security solutions, 4 in 5 (79%) anticipate introducing them to their business within a year. While this clearly represents an opportunity for the IT reseller community to enhance its service offering, the report does highlight two trends that may inhibit growth; the first being the physical securityindustry’s ability to adopt the as-a-service business model; the second is system integration with emergent technology such as AI.

Alex Hilton, CEO of The Cloud Industry Forum, added: “With cloud technology we have a toolset that changes the way businesses think and act, ensuring a competitive landscape for years to come. Morphean’s latest research reveals that decision makers are seeing better security, cost benefits and improved functionality as a result of a switch to cloud-enabled security solutions. Cloud presents very real opportunities, but vendors need to hone their offerings and capabilities in order for its full potential to be realised across all markets and sectors.”

The Morphean survey also found that there has been a 5% drop in cloud investment over the past year. In 2018, 33% of the IT budget was spent on cloud services over the previous 24 months and this figure has dropped to 31.38% for 2019. This is in spite of the fact that the majority of respondents (78%) had said that they expected cloud related spending to increase due to the favourable benefits it presents. It’s not the only contradiction found in the report.

Cloud is key to driving operational performance, and yet 78% of IT managers felt that this area of the business was underperforming while only 36% identified it as a priority for improvement.