Cloud In The Workplace: Okta Illuminates Enterprise App Trends

Businesses @ Work

As an identity, mobility and access management technology provider, Okta is positioned to have unique insight into how enterprises, including their employees, partners, contractors and customers, are using cloud-based software.

Okta's latest Businesses @ Work survey updates a report released in August of last year, turning a spotlight once again on how cloud apps and services are changing the workplace.

The San Francisco-based company looked at the apps, devices and services that its business customers consume. Among the findings: Traditional, on-premise software companies are reinventing themselves in the cloud as enterprises build out their application portfolios with the latest and greatest apps.

Methodology

Okta performs millions of authentications and verifications across the globe every day for its customers, and their employees, contractors, and partners.

To compile the Businesses @ Work report, the company anonymized customer data from its network of thousands of applications, custom integrations, and enterprise customers.

One caveat: "Because Okta is a cloud-first identity and mobility technology management company, Okta's customers are likely to be more cloud- and mobile-friendly than your average business," the report stated.

Strange Bedfellows (Office 365 and Google Apps)

Okta discovered a "surprising" number of its customers, across all industries, were working with both of the two leading cloud-based productivity suites. The actual number varied across industries, from 27 percent overlap among software developers to 4 percent in construction.

The survey revealed more than 40 percent of companies using both Office 365 and Google Apps do so because different departments prefer different applications, presumably for online collaboration needs, according to Okta.

Thirty percent of overlapping customers used Office 365 for licensing desktop products such as Excel, Word and PowerPoint only, and they used Google Apps for day-to-day email and collaboration.

Industries that tended to favor Office 365 were finance, biotech and construction, while Internet and marketing firms were more likely to go with Google's product.

Slackers

The fastest-growing cloud app amongst Okta customers in the second half of 2015 was Slack, notching a 77 percent increase in adoption.

While Slack's leaders have set their sights on all communications that take place inside the workplace, the popular collaboration app hasn't eliminated email in the modern enterprise just yet.

"While email remains the most widely assigned app today, Slack is picking up speed...and fast," Okta's report noted. "Slack is one of the most widely assigned apps in our network today."

An App For Everyone

"As the digital revolution goes mainstream, every type of worker—not just the knowledge worker—is using cloud apps," the report stated.

Cloud-based software is becoming more widespread as it assumes a wider range of roles for companies, with different types of employees—from developers to HR to creative types –using niche apps to be more productive.

Adding to the use of off-the-shelf public cloud services, "as mainstream adoption of the cloud continues, custom apps that fill even more specialized needs are growing in our network as well," the report said.

Old Timers In The Cloud

After years of development efforts and rounds of acquisitions, traditional technology vendors are re-inventing themselves in the cloud.

Companies like Adobe, Microsoft, Oracle and SAP have responded successfully to the shift in software delivery.

Cloud application adoption within the Okta network from Adobe (Creative Cloud), SAP (Concur and SuccessFactors) and Microsoft (Office 365) grew 144, 133 and 116 percent respectively in 2015, the report stated. Oracle saw 68 percent growth among Okta customers.

Tech giants taking an acquisition approach to achieving a cloud-first posture—like Oracle with its purchases of Eloqua, Responsys and Taleo; or SAP with Concur and SuccessFactors—have made technology developed by startups more relevant to business customers.

Security Investments Ramping

Security breaches that make headlines has become commonplace. That's why companies are ramping up their usage of multi-factor authentication techniques to secure business information.

Okta found that 30 percent of the companies it evaluated are using multi-factor authentication in at least one application.

Ninety percent of customers have at least one SAML-enabled application and 40 percent have enabled automated de-provisioning.

The Digital Revolution Has Arrived

Okta's data shows 80 percent of enterprises are building custom applications on their platforms, and the average customer or partner is accessing five total applications via its security solutions.

At least one off-the-shelf cloud app—such as Box, Jive, or Salesforce—is being used by 83 percent of customers and their partners.

In a study done last year, Okta noted that company size doesn't actually have much bearing on the number of off-the-shelf cloud apps employees within those companies are accessing.

In the latest survey, Okta found customers are using somewhere between 10 and 16 apps, representing a 20 percent uptick from the previous year.

"The market opportunity here is tremendous," the report noted.

Fastest Growers

Okta compiled a list of the fastest growing enterprise apps in the second half of 2015. Here it is:

Slack: 77 percent

Tableau: 65 percent

New Relic: 56 percent

Windows Azure: 46 percent

Lynda.com: 44 percent

DocuSign: 41 percent

Pingdom: 39 percent

Bluejeans: 38 percent

Pagerduty: 37 percent

Adobe Creative Cloud: 36 percent

Amazon Web Services: 36 percent

Lucidchart: 34 percent

Trello: 32 percent

ServiceNow: 31 percent