Open source technology provides better security, reveals IDC survey
ConvergenceAsia staff
01/10/2007

According to IDC’s survey report The Momentum of Open Source: Adoption Plans and Challenges in Australia, Korea, India and the People’s Republic of China, the top most influential factor for deploying open source technology was better protection against security breaches.

The study, which presents the results and analysis of the IDC Exclusive Software Adoption Survey, conducted in 2007, examines the current and future adoption trends of open source technology, as well as the reasons for deploying open source technology.

The survey results suggest that organisations in India and the People's Republic of China (PRC) deployed open source technology more than their counterparts in Australia and Korea. Furthermore, as expected, a larger number of small and medium size businesses (SMBs) in all four countries were deploying open source technology compared to large businesses.

“The results indicate that organisations perceived open source technology as providing better security compared to proprietary products," said Prianka Srinivasan, Market Analyst at IDC's Asia/Pacific Software Research team. “Though cost-efficiency remains a key decision factor, the results also suggest that organisations look forward to leverage open source technology to primarily fulfill their requirements for specific functionalities instead of widespread deployment.”

When segmenting the data by company size, it emerged that SMBs in all four countries deployed open source technology primarily to ensure protection from security threats, which is similar to large organisations in Australia, India and the PRC. Large organisations from Korea, however, cited better management tools and utilities as the leading factor.

"IDC believes that open source technology and software will appear in the higher end of the application stack in the coming years. Commercial vendors of open source software will need to provide extensive support and training services, as well as address the issues of interoperability, in order to take advantage of the addressable market for open source technology in the region,” added Srinivasan.

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