May 2017

APAC / May 2017 5 NEWS , In an international survey carried out by deVere Group, one of the world’s largest independent financial services organisations, 69% of those polled said that they would never relocate back to the UK. 10% said they would consider it, whilst 21% said ‘maybe’. Despite most respondents saying they would not consider returning to Britain, the poll also found that 72% still regularly send money back to the UK and that 87% could save more in their overseas location. The survey also shows that 23% relocated from the UK primari- ly for work/career reasons. The 808 respondents who participat- ed currently reside in the U.S, Australia, the UAE, Hong Kong, Spain, France, Germany and South Africa. Nigel Green, founder and CEO of deVere Group, the world’s lead- ing expat financial advisory firm, said of the findings: “The number of Britons living outside the UK has soared in recent years. Offi- cially there are approximately 5 million Brits now living overseas, although the real figure is univer- sally acknowledged to be consid- erably higher as many expats do not register themselves in their new countries of residence with the relevant authorities. “Extrapolated to the total number of [only officially] identified British expats, that amounts to 3.5million Brits abroad vowing never to re- turn to the UK.” He continues: “The survey under- scores that for most people living abroad is a rewarding and fulfill- ing experience. This outcome is likely down to several key factors including better or more lucrative career opportunities, lower cost of living, higher quality of life, high quality childcare and education, lower crime levels, and good weather. As an expat of many years myself, I recognise this pos- itive scenario well. “However, the fact that seven out of 10 expats state that they would never return to the UK, also con- cerns me. “Are these people really 100% sure that they will never return, The company sur- veyed more than 2,000 ITDMs globally, including Australia, and found that the majority are positive about cloud and are planning to expand the types of IT services they run in the cloud in the coming years. Overall, ITDMs from nearly 100 countries had an overwhelming- ly positive opinion of cloud, with 80.1% responding affirmatively, with 63.5% of respondents work- ing for companies with fewer than 500 employees. While many ap- pear to be comfortable with cloud as a strategic IT delivery model, it does not necessarily mean they have moved their entire IT infra- structure there. Findings show that the most popular cloud func- tions were Web hosting, blog and content management (39.2%), email (32%) and file sharing (32.2%) capabilities. While many of the ITDMs sur- veyed, claimed that they are hosting several basic applications on the cloud, a significant num- ber are planning to deploy more complex business applications in 2018. The most popular include: network monitoring (34.6%), sales, CRM and ticketing systems (35.4%), and backup (33.9%). “Widespread migration to the cloud in the SMB market is al- ready underway, especially here in Australia, said Andrew Timms, Sales Director for APAC at Paessler. “The uptake of cloud and prevalence of BYOD has played a major role in the IT de- partment. We will continue to see system administrators leverage the cloud model, together with existing on premise applications to better manage local area net- works, switches and data rooms. Welcome to the hybrid future.” Despite high levels of cloud ap- proval overall, many ITDMs were still sceptical about certain as- pects of the technology. Specif- ically, data security stood out as the biggest concern, with 44.7% stating it poses a significant ob- stacle, with an additional 41.3% who said it is somewhat concern- ing. “The findings from this survey confirm that the transformative impact of the cloud does not only exclusively impact enterprises; the SMB market are also starting to reap the true benefits,” said Timms. To view the full report, please vis- it www.paessler.com/campaign/ cloud-survey. For more on PRTG, please visit www.paessler.com. Cloud Adoption Growing among SMBs Worldwide Paessler AG, the innovative network monitoring specialist, onMay 4 released the findings of new research into how global IT decisionmakers (ITDMs) feel about cloud computing and how they are using it tomeet the demands of today’s changing business climate. N or perhaps be forced to return to the UK for reasons beyond their control, such as a change in fam- ily circumstances, being made redundant, or political upheaval in their new country of residence? Are they sure they will retire or be retired forever overseas? “No-one knows for sure what the future holds, plus the expat life- style can be, by its very nature, quite transient. The concern is that those who assume that they will never return to the UK, or in- deed relocate somewhere else, is that they will not have all the available and/or necessary finan- cial options open to them should they need to go back to Britain or elsewhere for whatever reason. “Expats should ensure that flex- ible, cross-border financial solu- tions form a key part of their over- all personal financial strategy.” He goes on to say: “It is encour- aging that 87% can save more living overseas. But to make this money work effectively, to make it truly worthwhile putting this mon- ey aside, they need to use their expat status to their financial ad- vantage, explore all their options, and cover all the cross-border bases. “And whilst it is encouraging in some respects – in the sense that they are not cutting off all finan- cial ties - that 72% of those sur- veyed regularly send money back to the UK, it is, in our experience, likely that this is for one specific purpose, and not part of a wider, integrated plan. “In addition, if they are using tradi- tional banking services, they are likely to be being caught out by unnecessarily high transfer fees. This highlights why expats should consider their finances holistically and over the longer-term.” Mr Green concludes: “Whilst liv- ing an international life is a hugely positive experience for most peo- ple, it is imperative not to rule-out the possibility of returning back to the UK or moving on somewhere else in the future. “If expats fail to plan for such eventualities by not considering all cross- border financial options now, they could be compromising their longer-term financial security.”