In the next four years, nearly 43% of CIOs (Chief Information Officers) will adopt cloud computing as compared to just 3% now, a Gartner report predicted.
Along with IT models, new light-weight technologies such as cloud computing, software as a service (SaaS) and social networks will help the CIO to redefine IT, said Gartner Executive Programs research head and group vice-president Mark McDonald.
"These technologies were selected by CIOs the most often and are the top-two technologies for 2011 and are well-suited for this budget reality, as they offer similar service levels at lower budget costs," McDonald added.
The Gartner survey, which included responses from 2,014 CIOs representing over $160bn in corporate and public-sector IT spending across 50 countries and 38 industries, also noted that their IT budgets will remain flat across the globe.
The survey indicated that CIOs may be able to reallocate IT budget savings, rather than simply returning them to the organisation in 2011.
CIOs anticipate the ability to fund infrastructure changes and new projects by reallocating resources within that budget.
McDonald said, "The resource realities indicated in the 2011 CIO Agenda Survey raise the urgency and importance of adopting new infrastructure and operations technologies, such as cloud services and virtualization."
