How Big Is The Cloud?

We work in an industry that thrives on data. Specifically, financial data. As in, how much are businesses spending on IT? The managed services profession went through many years of financial modeling darkness. Everyone seemed to know it was growing, but we didn't know how much or how fast.

While we have gotten a little better in predicting managed services market growth, we seem to be little better at predicting the size, rate of growth, or even the general shape of this thing we call cloud computing. Let's take a look at some data points and see if we can't make some sense of it.

Managed Services Hasn't Stopped Growing Since 2003

Since the DotCom years and 9/11 left their marks on the global economies, the managed services profession has been enjoying a very reliable trend line of growth since the latter half of 2003. Yes, there have been years of less growth than others, but growth is still growth.

Even during the tumultuous 2008-2010 economic crisis, MSPs reported solid opportunities, even as they were dealing with changing service product lines internally. Whenever there is uncertainty in IT, MSPs thrive. This is what MSPs do well, they solve problems involving IT and business.

MSPAlliance projected the managed services industry in North America to be generating approximately in 2015. While this was only a North American projection, it represents a healthy industry, whose future was not always certain.