New research suggests adoption of private cloud solutions is driving to the hosted private cloud market to reach $44 billion by 2020, as large enterprise start to transition to hybrid IT environments.

The research, 3Q15 Hosted Private Cloud Benchmark from analyst firm Technology Business Research, says that although the hosted private cloud market is small compared to the expansive public cloud market, the sector is growing.

According to TBR, because the market lacks one clear leader, time and space remain for small vendors to catch up to front-runner IBM.

The private cloud market is unique, with independent software vendors, systems integrators, born-on the-cloud vendors and hosting companies all investing to gain market share, the company explains.

“The best way to win in this market in 2016 will be to promote relatable success stories and case studies that showcase the added efficiencies and cost savings associated with hosted cloud environments as well as the security benefits of deploying workloads in hosted private cloud environments,” says TBR cloud analyst Cassandra Mooshian.

The benchmark and TBR's 2H15 Private Cloud Customer Research, which highlights hosted private cloud and self-built private cloud adoption, found 71% of private cloud users view private cloud as superior to public cloud based on security.

Mooshian says a shift in customers' investments over the past six months from development (PaaS) to production (IaaS and SaaS), noticeably impacted the market; “although, IaaS remains the largest segment in the private cloud market as enterprise value dedicated cloud instances.