– New Mendix survey shows that British businesses plan to develop software at a faster rate than those on the continent
– The pandemic has led to faster digital disruption than expected, but UK businesses are excited about the opportunity this presents
– Low-code is already helping UK businesses deal with digital disruption and will drive software development moving forward
Mendix, a Siemens business and global leader in low-code application development for the enterprise, today announced the results of a new survey that shows British businesses are set to accelerate their software development at a pace faster than their European rivals.
UK businesses embrace pandemic’s digital disruption
The study, which questioned 2,000 IT decision makers and software developers globally, including 281 based in the UK, found that 79% of UK businesses are planning to accelerate software development in the next two years. This is higher than the average across Europe (74%) and much higher than German businesses (69%), as UK businesses look to get an advantage in a post-Brexit world.
The pandemic has increased the demand for digitalisation to levels never seen before. The research finds that over half of UK businesses (51%) believe that the last two years has led to more digital disruption than expected, compared with just 6% that have seen less disruption than expected.
Many UK businesses are embracing this disruption as an opportunity. Nearly half (49%) of respondents are excited about the digital acceleration and software development demand, whilst only 23% are worried and 20% feel overwhelmed.
Low-code drives digital transformation
To deal with this digital disruption and increased need for software development, many UK businesses are turning to low-code platforms. The UK leads the way in Europe for low-code adoption, which has entered the mainstream globally, with 80% of businesses already using low-code. This is higher than the European average of 74% and much further ahead of Germany, where 69% of businesses are using low-code technology.
UK organisations are using low-code to build applications that meet a number of business needs, with the simple drag-and-drop solution enabling faster development and deployment. The most common types of applications built using low-code by UK businesses are IOT applications (35%), productivity applications (33%) and applications to automate existing processes (31%).
The pandemic has also been a big driver for low-code adoption within UK organisations. 85% of businesses have seen greater adoption of low-code as a result of COVID-19. On top of this, 23% of UK businesses have used low-code to build a pandemic-related application.
Nick Ford, VP of product and solutions marketing for Mendix, explains: “There is no doubt that the pandemic has led to mass digital disruption for UK businesses. With operations forced online, many organisations had to drive digital transformation at a faster rate than ever before. It is really positive to see that UK companies are embracing this change and looking to use it as an opportunity.”
He adds: “Despite this, there still remains a talent crunch in the UK that isn’t going away anytime soon. This is why so many UK businesses are adopting low-code, instead of trying to hire expensive developers that are in short supply. Low-code puts software development in the hands of citizen developers who already exist within business, providing them with the tools they need to build applications and solve business problems. Mendix has been pioneering this approach for years; we are very excited to see how far low-code developers take our platform to create solutions to problems that would otherwise have defied the imagination.”
