Poor Network Performance Stalls Digital Transformation

Poor Network Performance Stalls Digital Transformation in Australia and New Zealand

New Citrix report reveals network outages are costing businesses up to almost two weeks of lost productivity per employee

AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND – 14 SEPTEMBER, 2016 – Citrix today announced new research revealing more than half of Australian (52%) and New Zealand (55%) companies admit their IT networks require upgrading if they are going to take advantage of emerging technologies, such as virtual and augmented reality, the Internet of Things, and wearables.

The extent and urgency at which organisations need to upgrade their IT infrastructures was apparent in the productivity losses caused by network outages in both countries. Citrix’s The Impact of Network Performance on Business Goals and Cost study found for Australian businesses’ network outages equate to almost two weeks (71 hours) of lost productivity per employee per year. In New Zealand, the cost of poor network performance (52 hours) is more than six days lost productivity per employee per year.

Highlighting the impact network issues are having on revenue, businesses in Australia measuring the financial impact of lost productivity state it adversely affects 23 per cent of a company’s revenue source. New Zealand firms state it affects 14 per cent of the revenue stream.

“Our study shows the expectations for emerging technologies are high, with many businesses aware of the positive impact they can have. However, the reality is investment in the majority of solutions will first require investment in somewhat ‘mundane’ areas, one of which is the networking environment,” said Anandh Maistry, Senior Director, Citrix Australia and New Zealand.

The applications having the greatest adverse impact on network performance are those initially deployed to boost productivity and collaboration. The top three workloads impacting IT environments in ANZ were email, voice/video, and office productivity applications.

“Financial and productivity losses are the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the impact of underperforming networks,” said Tim Dillon, Founder and Director of Tech Research Asia. “It can leave many businesses without the ability to accurately capture data, and engage and collaborate with customers and employees in a timely and meaningful manner.”

“Companies today are more real-time, more analytical, and more demanding of their technology investments. Yet the data tells us business goals are at significant risk from sub-standard network performance,” Dillon added.

The Causes of Network Problems

In Australia 57 per cent of Australian companies experienced mobile network connection problems, and 55 per cent had issues with fixed network connectivity. In New Zealand, 55 per cent of respondents cited mobile problems, and three-quarters (73%) stated fixed network problems.

Service provider outages were the primary cause of network problems in Australia (29%). Coverage blackspots (28%) and unplanned hardware failures (27%) rounded out the top three causes of network outages in the country.

For New Zealand a lack of bandwidth was identified as the most common cause of network problems (35%), with general network reliability (29%) and ahead of unplanned hardware failures (29%) the next most common causes.

“Digital transformation is a priority for many businesses in Australia and New Zealand, and to deliver it cloud infrastructures have become an integral part of the business IT network. With workloads and data increasingly being moved to cloud environments – a trend the research shows will accelerate in the coming months – it’s critical organisations in Australia and New Zealand act now to ensure their networks can handle the growing demands being placed on them,” said Maistry.

The research conducted by Tech Research Asia surveyed 266 Australian and New Zealand enterprises to better understand how poor network and application performance impact their broader business objectives. Respondents were required to hold an executive, senior IT decision maker role and have knowledge of their company’s networking and application environments.

To download a copy of the whitepaper, please click here.

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About Citrix Systems, Inc.

Citrix (NASDAQ:CTXS) aims to power a world where people, organizations and things are securely connected and accessible to make the extraordinary possible. Its technology makes the world’s apps and data secure and easy to access, empowering people to work anywhere and at any time. Citrix provides a complete and integrated portfolio of Workspace-as-a-Service, application delivery, virtualization, mobility, network delivery and file sharing solutions that enables IT to ensure critical systems are securely available to users via the cloud or on-premise and across any device or platform. With annual revenue in 2015 of $3.28 billion, Citrix solutions are in use by more than 400,000 organizations and over 100 million users globally. Learn more at www.citrix.com.

About Tech Research Asia

TRA is a fast-growing IT analyst, research, and consulting firm with an experienced and diverse team in Sydney, Melbourne, Kuala Lumpur and Tokyo. The firm advises executive technology buyers and suppliers across Asia Pacific and provide rigorous, fact-based, research, consulting and market engagement services. We also conduct our own independent research on the issues, trends, and strategies that are important to executives and other leaders that want to leverage the power of modern technology. Visit us at www.techresearch.asia for more information.

Related Links:

• Citrix Blog: Closing the $2.7 trillion Productivity Gap

• Learn more about Citrix networking solutions: https://www.citrix.com/products/netscaler-adc/

• Citrix Blog: NetScaler family expands to feature SD-WAN

• Citrix Named A Leader in Gartner Magic Quadrant for Application Delivery Controllers for Tenth Year

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