Cloud is powering enterprise transformation, Verizon report says

What: Verizon's "State of the Market: Enterprise Cloud 2016," a report that analyzes cloud use and trends.

Why: Cloud computing is becoming a dominant approach for business systems, according to Verizon's report, which is based on survey data from the company's cloud customers and outside researchers and was released on Nov. 9.

Sixty-nine percent of the enterprises surveyed reported that they used cloud computing to significantly re-engineer at least one business process. That is almost double the number from the previous year. A large majority of enterprises said the cloud was a significant improvement from their old models and enhanced responsiveness while 65 percent said overall operations were improved.

Skepticism about the cloud is on the wane. Eighty-seven percent of companies believe cloud computing is comparable to on-premise computing, and 80 percent reported feeling as secure as or more secure with the cloud than with internal IT services. Consequently, 87 percent of enterprises are now using the cloud for at least one mission-critical workload, a number that Verizon predicts could reach 98 percent by next year.

Verbatim: "The capabilities and economics of cloud are changing so quickly that companies must review their decisions more frequently. Where in the past decisions about core systems might have looked 20 years ahead, today decisions made just a year ago could be no longer valid. Failure to revisit plans doesn't just risk overspending on IT, but could mean being outmaneuvered by competitors and losing market share."

Full report: Download the report here.