Spotlight: Database Migration Facilitates
Deployment of Hybrid Multicloud Solutions

Database workloads are some of the most-moved workloads within the enterprise. These mission-critical workloads are often some of the most costly and complex to move or modernize. In fact, managing databases across private, public, and edge deployments was cited as one of the #1 challenges associated with database management:

Q: What are the key challenges your organization faces in managing databases?

46

Managing database
across private, public
and edge deployments

46

Managing a growing
number of databases

44

Managing volumes of
databases at scale

43

Supporting modern
apps development

40

Database patching
and upgrade tasks

38

Managing open
source databases

35

Database
provisioning

However, this challenge has not stopped a growing number of enterprises from undertaking database modernization and migration initiatives. But many organizations find themselves faced with data management complexity and siloed operations, as databases are replicated and copied across multiple environments, including on-premises and cloud, to meet application needs. Given this reality, it comes as no surprise that managing a growing number of databases is the #2 most cited challenge among ECI respondents.

Organizations can begin addressing these challenges by adopting a common control plane capable of managing database provisioning, backup, patching/updating, and copy management regardless of the environment a database sits in (e.g., on premises, cloud, edge). Most importantly, they should look for solutions delivering a unified offering among different IT environments as well as supporting different database vendors. This approach will help organizations address two of the top database management challenges that enterprises experience today.

Spotlight: Top C-Level IT Priorities for 2024

Ensuring data security and protecting against ransomware is the #1 IT leadership priority for 2024. This comes as no surprise. Ransomware attacks, and data loss/downtime events are two major reasons why large organizations find themselves on the wrong side of the news headlines. For C-level executives and IT leadership, these events can have career-altering impacts, and preventing/mitigating attack and or data loss should absolutely remain their top priority.

Q: What do you think are the top priorities for your organization’s CIO/CTO/Leadership?

  • #1: Data security and ransomware protection
  • #2: Implementing the right hybrid IT operations
  • #3: Implementing AI strategies
  • #4: Optimizing operations
  • #5: Accelerating application development
  • #6: Minimizing cost
  • #7: Sustainability

Implementing the right hybrid IT operations was ranked #2, likely driven by ongoing requirements for IT leaders to find new ways to deploy and manage infrastructure across owned data centers and different cloud platforms. Today there are a range of hybrid infrastructure software and services available for implementation, and IT leaders should ensure these solutions can enable infrastructure agnostic operations, so applications and data can run seamlessly across different cloud-powered data centers and services.

Coming in as the #3 C-level priority is the implementation of AI strategies. Media hype and commercial availability of AI tools and services drove enterprise interest in AI technology to new heights during 2023. This hype will continue to influence C-level decision making in 2024. For detailed information on AI technology and solution evolution, and its impact on IT infrastructure trends, please see Nutanix's State of Enterprise AI Report.

Digging deeper into C-level response rates uncovered the following findings:

89% of C-level respondents agree that having a single platform to run and manage all applications and data across clouds is ideal for their organization (6 points higher than decision makers)

81% of C-level respondents say that investments in hiring and retaining development of engineering staff will increase over 2024 (14 points higher than decision makers)

In addition to ransomware protection, data privacy is high on the executive radar. C-level respondents ranked data privacy as the #1 data management challenge faced by their organization (ransomware protection was ranked #2).

91% of C-level respondents agree that sustainability is a priority to their organization (4 points higher than decision makers).

Top C-Level IT Priorities for 2024

#1

Data security and
ransomware protection

#2

Implementing the right
hybrid IT operations

#3

Implementing
AI strategies

Sustainability Initiatives Focused on Over the Past Year by Geography

We modernized our IT infrastructure to improve sustainability

Aimed to better our ability to identify areas for reducing waste products (e.g. harmful pollutants, chemicals, paper etc.)

Improving compliance with environmental regulations

Our capability to monitor greenhouse emissions and our carbon footprint has improved

Remote working facilitated by technologies has reduced pollution from employee travel to a central working location

We utilize more renewable energy sources

Become carbon neutral by 2050

Americas

EMEA

APJ

Figure 10: Sustainability Initiatives Focused on Over the Past Year by Geography

Ransomware Recovery: When looking at ransomware recovery by region, regional distribution of recovery times are relatively similar with slight differences in proportions of organizations able to recover within hours vs days. APJ indicates the highest proportion of respondents who said they were able to recover within hours (see Figure 11). Interestingly, 14% of EMEA respondents say their organization has not experienced a ransomware attack in the last 3 years, much higher than Americas and APJ, where the percentage was just 9% of respondents in both regions.

Time Required to Recover from Ransomware Attack by Geography

Our operations were fully restored in a few hours

Our operations were fully restored in a few days

Our operations were fully restored in a few weeks

Our operations were mostly restored within a few hours, but additional impacts of the attack continued for longer than a few weeks

Our operations were mostly restored in a few days, but additional impacts of the attack continued for longer than a few weeks

Americas

EMEA

APJ

Figure 11: Time Required to Recover from Ransomware Attack by Geography

Data Management: Similar to the global average, ransomware protection and data security top the list of biggest data management challenges in Americas and APJ. However EMEA broke from this trend, ranking data privacy and data storage usage guidance (e.g., GDPR) as their #1 and #2 challenges, respectively – with ransomware protection ranked #3. Cost remained the lowest-ranked data management challenge across all global regions (see Figure 12).

Biggest Data Management Challenges by Region

Ransomware protection and data security

Following guidance on data storage and usage (e.g., GDPR)

Data privacy

Linking data from multiple environments

Lack of visibility over where data resides

Cost

Americas

EMEA

APJ

Figure 12: Biggest Data Management Challenges by Region