06 December 2019
More than half of UK firms (55%) have experienced a cyber attack in 2019, up 15% year-on-year, making cybersecurity their main priority.
A report by IT infrastructure provider Softcat also exposed how the UK businesses are taking such statistics, with 83% of industries putting cyber security at the top of the list.
Now that more than two-thirds of global employees work remotely, on-demand access to secure and optimised data is now a basic business necessity. This is reflected in the report with 56% of industries ranking end user computing and mobility as their second biggest technology priority.
The construction industry and two public sectors – education and healthcare – rank end user computing and mobility as their number one priority, ahead of cyber security investment.
Meanwhile, print services came in as the lowest priority for businesses, but surprisingly emerging technologies (big data, IoT and AI) also rated poorly.
Surprisingly, emerging technologies are the second lowest tech priority for the third year running, despite the hype surrounding the areas where the UK has the potential to be a global leader.
Real estate, private health and social work, plus energy and utilities ranked big data, IoT and AI the highest in seventh and eighth place respectively, but these results are still lower than expected.
“Cyber security continues to be the number one priority for most organisations,” said Adam Louca, chief technologist – security at Softcat. “This year, we’ve seen the first enforcement actions as part of GDPR, proving the ICO isn’t afraid to punish those falling short of the mark. “Investing in security by design not only reduces risk but enables organisations to take advantage of new technologies more rapidly.”
Elsewhere, investment in the data centre and cloud is ranked third overall, highlighting how hybrid cloud is an integral part of evolving IT strategies, helping organisations gain competitive advantages.
Softcat surveyed over 1,600 of its customers across 18 different industries to reveal the biggest 2020 technology priorities. n
