3 in 4 IT organizations in Singapore run outdated operating systems

Microsoft is ending support for Windows Server 2003 and 2003 R2.

Spiceworks, a global professional network of more than 5 million IT professionals, says that 73% of organizations who use its tools in Singapore are still running at least one instance of Windows Server 2003 as of June 2014.

According to Kathryn Pribish, IT program manager at Spiceworks, the rise of cloud computing and a more mobile workforce have changed technology environments and forced IT departments to rethink how they address challenges within their organization.

A release by Microsoft says that in accordance with it’s Product Support Lifecycle Policy, assisted support, including updates and patches, from Microsoft will no longer be available after 15 July 2015. While companies can continue to run Windows Server 2003 after this date, this leaves servers and applications vulnerable to security threats and downtime, and may no longer meet compliance requirements. Maintenance costs for aging hardware will also increase along with costs for intrusion detection systems, firewalls and network segmentation.

Here’s more from the release:

Pribish says “CIOs today need a modern cloud-based IT infrastructure to power the rising demand for apps, mobility and data insights. With technology now truly an indispensable part of business, it is time for CIOs to migrate to the mobile first, cloud first era.

Joey Tan, cloud and enterprise lead at Microsoft Singapore, adds,” While it’s very common for customers to manage a mixed environment of old and new, with a year to go, it is time for IT decision makers to accelerate their move to the cloud. A typical server migration takes 200 days while an application migration takes over 300 days.”