Cloud survey uncovers seven storage services trends

While we might consider an average of 12.5 TB of backup data stored in a cloud service a relatively modest figure, the cloud backup users in our survey told us that on average they employ cloud-based backup services for 55% of their total backup needs. That suggests that cloud backup use might be tilted more toward smaller companies than enterprises. In addition, that 55% figure represents a fairly big jump in cloud backup services compared to one year ago, upwards of approximately 11 points.

With higher percentages at the lower end of the scale -- 21% report less than 10% of their backup data is in the cloud, while 22% said 10% to 40% is stored there -- these results may suggest that larger companies are using cloud backup services strategically (e.g., for remote offices and mobile users) and/or in limited testing environments.

If there has been caution in some companies' approach to cloud-based backup services, many anticipate increased use of the services. Six months from now, 41% of companies anticipate that 60% or more of their backup data will end up in a cloud backup provider's data center.