In today’s digital-first world, the cloud plays a critical role in helping organizations gain faster access to new technologies in mission-critical areas. These cloud services cover needs across a diverse technology ecosystem, including compute services, data services, application framework services, and usage multiplier services. Organizations, developers, and IT organizations are relying upon these cloud services to drive innovation, automation, and insights of value. Furthermore, cloud continues to be defined by fundamental cloud governance, consisting of the managing, optimizing, migrating, and securing of diverse cloud resources and data sets.

IDC interviewed 12 organizations in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) about their use of Amazon Web Services (AWS) as an IT platform for running their businesses. These EMEA-based study participants reported achieving significant value with AWS as a cost-effective, high-performing, and agile foundation for running many of their most business-critical services and applications.