Research conducted by the Cloud Industry Forum (now under new management and has morphed into Tech Industry Forum) revealed that ESG and sustainability is important to the majority, (86%) of businesses when deciding which cloud vendor to work with, with almost half (44%) considering it extremely important.
Data from the 2024 report indicates that organisations value ESG highly, with 40% of respondents reporting that IT sustainability is an important project for their organisation.
This ranks equally with other areas of business such as security and cloud migration and is second only to artificial intelligence (42%).
Despite this, when deciding on whether or not to work with a cloud service provider, cost is still king, being the most important priority for 45% of respondents. Next, 41% referenced the availability of services and 39% mentioned partnering with a trustworthy company as being key factors, all ranking more highly than sustainability credentials (28%). However, the research also found that 49% of organisations said they would always reject a prospective vendor if they gave a poor response on their ESG and sustainability strategy.
This continued emphasis on sustainability is supported by the finding that 79% of organisations are now measuring the carbon footprint of their existing data storage infrastructure in the cloud. According to the data, 47% of organisations have already been measuring this for more than 12 months, and just 7% indicated that they do not have any plans to measure this in the future.
Further, organisations are taking crucial steps to reach net zero despite economic constraints, with 87% of organisations planning to reach net zero by at least 2050. More than a quarter (26%) of respondents plan to achieve the milestone before 2030.
David Terrar, Tech Industry Forum’s CEO said: “Cloud service providers should take note that a large proportion of businesses are prepared to reject partnerships on the basis of sustainability alone and should ensure they are setting themselves high standards in this area. Those companies able to demonstrate clear consideration of sustainability issues will stand ahead of those relying on the prospect of cost savings alone.”
