Cisco publishes its third annual cloud computing industry research Report

By 2017 cloud traffic will account for more than two-thirds of global data center traffic and will grow by more than four times times from 2012 to 2017

BEIJING, October 16, 2013-Cisco predicts that global cloud traffic will be the fastest growing segment of data center traffic in the Cloud Index, the third annual Cisco Cloud Computing Industry Report (2012–2017). This flow is expected to increase by 4.5 times times, from 2012 1.2 ZB annual traffic growth to 2017 5.3 ZB annual rate of growth (CAGR) up to 35%. By 2017, total global data center traffic will grow by three times times, totaling 7.7 ZB per annum.

About 17% of the data center traffic will be driven by end-user access to the cloud, including web surfing, video streaming, collaboration, and interconnected devices, all of which will drive the creation of "interconnected things," the networking of people, data, processes, and things.

Other data center traffic is not generated directly by end users, but by data center and cloud computing workloads. Individual users typically do not perceive activities that use these workloads. For 2012-2017, Cisco predicts that another 7% of data center traffic will be generated between data centers, mainly from data replication and software/system updates. 76% of the data center traffic will be generated in the data center, most of which will be generated by storage, production, and development data in virtualized environments.

From a regional perspective, the Cisco Cloud Computing Industry research report predicts that by 2017 the Middle East and Africa will have the highest cloud-rate growth rate (57% annual composite growth rate), followed by the Asia-Pacific (43% Annual composite growth rate), and the Central and Eastern European region (36% of the annual composite growth rate).

Overview：

The Cisco Cloud Computing Industry Research Report (2012–2017) aims to predict global data center and Cloud Internet Protocol (IP) traffic growth and development trends. The Cisco Cloud Computing Industry Research Report, as a supplemental resource for existing network traffic research, offers new insights and ideas on emerging trends affecting data centers and cloud architectures. This prediction becomes increasingly important as networks and data centers become increasingly interconnected in providing cloud services.

The Cisco Cloud Computing Industry Research Report, which includes a "workload migration" forecast, shows workloads that move from traditional data centers to more virtualized cloud servers.

The forecast also includes additional reports on the details of the cloud-ready region, which surveyed the fixed and mobile network capabilities of each region of the world, from nearly 150 countries and regions, in supporting business and consumer cloud computing applications and services.

The Cisco Cloud Computing industry research Report is generated by modeling and analyzing various direct and indirect data, including the monthly TB of traffic collected from multiple global data centers over the past year, the results of 9, more than 0 network tests, and third party market research reports.

Cloud traffic growth in different regions: from 2012-2017, the growth of cloud flows in the Middle East and Africa will be greatest. The Cisco Cloud Computing Industry Research Report now includes regional forecasts for cloud traffic growth.

2012, North America generated the largest cloud flow (469 EB), followed by the Asia-Pacific region (319 EB) and Europe (annual EB).

By 2017, North America will generate the largest cloud traffic (1.886 ZB per year), followed by the Asia Pacific region (1.876 ZB annually) and Europe (each year 770 EB).

Workload migration: Data center workloads will grow 2.3 times times from 2012 to 2017, and cloud workloads will grow 3.7 times times.

Cloud Ready:

To assess cloud readiness, Cisco analyzes various fixed and mobile network parameters. The company analyzed average and median upload and download speeds and delays (this year increased the median value, to understand the changes in the end-user cloud readiness in each country, and to provide network performance characteristics for each region: Asia Pacific, Central and Eastern Europe, Latin America, Middle East and Africa, North America, and Europe. In this study, Cisco used the following sample application categories:

Basic Cloud application/network requirements
Download speed: up to 750 kbps; upload speed: up to 160 kbps
Intermediate Cloud application/Network requirements
Download speed: 751–2,500 kbps; upload speed: 251–1,000 kbps; latency: 159–100 milliseconds
Advanced Cloud application/network requirements
Download speed: higher than 2,500 kbps; upload speed: higher than 1,000 kbps; latency: less than 100 milliseconds

The current average fixed network performance feature in all regions can support today's intermediate level of cloud services.

Fixed networks in Asia Pacific, North America, Middle Eastern Europe, Western Europe and Latin America can support advanced cloud applications.

The current average mobile network performance characteristics in all regions can support a certain level of cloud services today.

Mobile networks in Asia, the Middle East and Africa and Latin America can support basic cloud applications.

The average performance of Middle Eastern Europe, North America and Europe mobile networks can support intermediate cloud applications.

In most areas, there will be a number of stationary and mobile network performance test results in the outlier countries that are higher than the average cloud-ready measurements in their area. For example, mobile networks in countries and regions such as Hong Kong and Singapore in Asia, and the United Arab Emirates in the Middle East and Africa, can support advanced cloud applications.

Doug Merritt, senior vice president of Cisco Products and solutions marketing, says: "People around the world are constantly demanding access to personal, corporate, and entertainment content anywhere on any device, and every transaction in a virtualized cloud computing environment has a series of impacts on the network." Given this continuing trend, we expect cloud traffic to increase dramatically over the next four years within the data center, between the data centers, and beyond the data center. ”