Banks are recognising the benefits of cloud computing – but progress remains slow.

That’s the verdict of consulting firm Accenture, who has released a new report focused on how banks need to win in the digital age.

The report, which showcased the opinions of 35 executives at global banks who were responsible for technology and information security, found very few to have been out of the loop altogether. Only 3% of those polled said they did not have a cloud strategy. The majority (40%) said they had agreed upon best practices but gotten no further, while 31% had core practices in place and 26% said they had core practices and measures for continuous improvement.

Spending on cloud services within IT budgets is predicted to rise in the coming years – but it is not exactly a huge acceleration. While those who are spending up to a fifth of their IT budget on cloud will remain at 17% across the next three years, by 2021 almost half (46%) of those polled said they would be spending 11-15% of their budgets on cloud services. This is up from 29% today.

When it came to cloud technologies transforming the operating model in IT, the consensus was again somewhat tepid. The majority – 43% – of those polled said they did expect their transition to cloud to drive changes in operating models, but they had not defined what the model was. 31% said they were in the process of defining and moving to a new operating model, with 26% going full steam ahead on the new paradigm.

“Banks recognise the need to build future IT systems on cloud platforms, and there are pockets of cloud deployment across most banks,” the report noted. “But many banks still lack a comprehensive cloud strategy that will enable a rapid shift to the cloud, and very few have defined an enterprise-level operating model for transferring existing applications to the cloud and systematically adding cloud-based applications and capacity.”

This need for banks to step up their initiatives has been covered by this publication previously. Writing in August, Roberto Mircoli of Virtustream noted how banks, more than many other industries, do not work to a ‘one cloud fits all’ idea. “Financial institutions must carefully select the CSP that is right and suitable for their needs,” Mircoli wrote. “Likewise, any CSP that an institution works with must have a firm understanding of the relevant compliance landscape.

“It is important to be able to demonstrate that a judgement call can be made when required,” added Mircoli. “This is where the CSP must have the deepest and broadest expertise on what it takes to migrate complex mission critical systems to the cloud.”

You can read the full report here.

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