How DevOps Helps Grease the Gears of the Application Economy

by Darryl K. Taft

In the app economy, it is applications that define the customer experience.

More than nine out of 10 executives face increased pressure to release apps more quickly.

DevOps enables enterprises to increase the pace and rate of software or services deployments.

The CA study, conducted by Vanson Bourne, featured 1,425 senior IT and line-of-business executives at enterprise organizations with revenues of $500 million or more in financial services, health care, retail, telecommunications and media/entertainment industries.

Forty-two percent of respondents said DevOps helps improve the performance of applications, while 29 percent said they are driven to DevOps because it enables simultaneous deployment across platforms.

The CA study showed that 49 percent of respondents from companies that are leading in the app economy said they are using DevOps, but only 6 percent of respondents from companies lagging behind said they use it.

Sixty-three percent of respondents said they are hiring folks with DevOps skills, and 51 percent said they would hire a consulting firm with DevOps expertise.

According to the survey, the top tools needed for DevOps are application performance management tools, followed by performance testing and then functional testing tools, among others.

Security or compliance concerns ranked as the biggest challenge to DevOps adoption in the survey. Organizational complexity was another big challenge.

Survey respondents said some of the major benefits for adopting DevOps include higher frequency of services deployments and more collaboration between departments.

Other benefits of DevOps include faster time to market, less time fixing applications, and lower development testing and operations.