The growth and interest in cloud computing are two different things entirely.

The growth is still minimal. The interest is astounding. Combined and you get a picture of a market still trying to find itself.

That about sums up “The Future of Cloud Computing,” a new survey conducted by North Bridge Venture Partners in partnership with GigaOM Pro and The 451 Group.  Results were released today at Structure, GigaOm’s conference about cloud computing.

There were 413 respondents from service providers and end users. The preliminary results show a market that is still experimenting. Perceptions are changing as more people are seeing cloud infrastructure as an opportunity to innovate.

The costs savings are a motivator for IT.  Security is still a concern. Managing a cloud infrastructure is considered complex. Most IT people believe cloud adoption will lead to an increase in hiring.

Some of the results:

• Forty percent of respondents indicated that they are only now experimenting with a move to the cloud while another 26% of responders are awaiting  market maturity before adopting a formal cloud strategy.
• The ability to quickly deploy applications is considered a big benefit as more enterprises struggle in keeping up with new application backlogs.
• Competitive differentiation, mobility, and ensuring application interoperability through the use of open cloud APIs are reasons for adoption.31% cite security as an obstacle. Interoperability and vendor lock-in are threats with 25% of respondents.
• People are split about the complexity in managing a cloud infrastructure. About 39% said it would be less complex while another 39% say it would be more complicated.

The results show a market that still has a lot of trepidation about cloud computing. Service providers are taking notice. Vendors are investing more in training. IBM has a number of programs around big data analytics and a host of other topics. HP has been running workshops to familiarize IT with cloud computing.

But, still, a major concern is about cost. So much so that HP has a $2 billion fund now to finance cloud adoption. Cloud is such a vague term that we have to question this financing. Is that cloud or data center automation?

For us, cloud is about speed and innovation. That’s what the forward looking customers see in it. Amazon Web Services provides speed and the ability to differentiate at the application layer. So does Rackspace and we expect OpenStack will provide that capability, too.

One of the biggest slowdowns? Interoperability. No one wants lock-in. That issue will have to be solved before cloud really sees its day.