Masters Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban.Cloud computing is a computing model that enables developing countries to open new business
ventures without having to spend extensive amounts of money in upfront capital investment;
“cloud computing is a practical approach to experience direct cost benefits, and it has the
potential to transform a data centre from a capital-intensive set up to a variable priced
environment. The main character of cloud computing is in the virtualization, distribution and
dynamically extendibility” (Chauhan, 2012, p. 1). Of all the models that utilise the network
as means for delivering computing resources, cloud computing is the best one yet; the cloud is
more scalable and allows consumers to add and remove resources as their computational needs
change without impacting business processes (Nuseibeh, 2011). There are other opportunities
that organisations stand to benefit from cloud computing adoption, but in spite of all the
opportunities, the rate at which organisations are adopting cloud Computing is increasing at a
slower pace than expected in South Africa. From the statistics released in 2018 by the Business
Software Alliance (BSA) and Global Cloud Computing Scorecard, it was highlighted that
South Africa had fallen behind in its efforts to adopt Cloud Computing and different reasons
were highlighted as a cause of this lag (BSA, 2018).
This research study aimed to investigate potential issues that impacted the organisation's desire
to adopt the cloud resulting in the low adoption rate. The technology-organisation-environment
(TOE) framework was the framework that was used in this research study. Four research
questions were developed as part of achieving the objectives for this research study. A sample
of organisations in the KwaZulu-Natal province was identified for this research study using the
convenience sampling technique and an online survey hosted in Survey Monkey was sent out
to the selected organisations. The collected data were analysed using SPSS tools. After analysis
was performed on the data, it was found that most challenges that organisations faced were
from external factors like infrastructure readiness, which organisations had no control over.
Internal challenges also affected the organisation’s adoption and usage of the cloud, but when
data was grouped according to either belonging to the internal or external group, it was found
that external issues affected organisations more than internal issues
