On a global level, organizational enterprise and new entrants are evaluating system and application software in relation to their business model, the needs of clients and the economics associated with going directly to the next generation of commercial and open source software technology. Within this operational reality, cloud computing is evolving from concept to a practical implementation. It is shifting the emphasis from locally managed server-client installations and information technology related services to externally located web-accessible computing centers consisting of thousands of servers. However, there is no single uniform precise definition of cloud computing and there are different types of clouds.

Major Players in Cloud Computing

The major players have been developing cloud computing services based upon strategic interest and its business model.

• Amazon and Salesforce.com offer cloud-based services such as e-mail, computer storage, and customer management software.

• Google operates a computing cloud built upon open source software which is optimized for Internet search.

• IBM's employs a hybrid commercial and open source cloud strategy developed from prototype projects with client companies and government agencies.

• Microsoft has its own software centric infrastructure for delivering cloud computing services.

• Oracle is selling software and software services.

• Other major technology suppliers which have cloud-related hardware and software products include Cisco, Dell, Hewlet-Packard, and SAP.

Key issues and areas of contention which have emerged are security, cost, performance, open standards, and shared information.

Google, uses open standards, but also keeps many things proprietary. Engineers in the company have acknowledged that Google has developed specialized semiconductors for some of its in-house operations. It doesn't patent the products, because that would show how they work. Executives felt that information would be used by competitors.

The Oracle Corporation strategy is based upon the assumption that engineering hardware and software together will provide better performance, ease of use, and lower cost. The Oracle cloud has been developed based upon open source standards with data services, Java services, and security services built in. Large corporate databases can be moved from a company's machine into the Oracle cloud or created in the Oracle cloud and moved back and forth into the clouds run by Amazon, IBM or other computing service providers running in Java. The Oracle cloud places in it direct opposition with Salesforce.

The emergence of cloud computing has not been a unifying force in information technology. Rather than making the consumer and business technology increasingly similar, the computer world is splitting into two separate camps: consumer and enterprise. In the consumer camp are Apple, Google, and most of the Asian hardware makers. The enterprise camp will service large companies and government agencies; the major players will be IBM, Dell, Cisco, and Oracle. Microsoft and Hewlet-Packard will straddle both markets.

For many enterprises, its information technology infrastructure is already under stress and the data flood is accelerating. Projections by market research firms indicate that there will be one trillion Internet-connected devices by 2012. The huge explosion of data is driving a movement to design systems around workloads in order to deliver the required computation and service and become more energy efficient. The hardware and software languages, development platforms, and scalable databases reflect competitive and evolutionary forces of commercial software providers, open source software alternatives, intellectual property laws, and anti-trust regulations.

Cloud Computing Services

Applying the ideas and principles of cloud computing to information technology operations can offer organizations agility and cost savings. However, despite the benefits a cloud environment promises, there are issues that will need to be addressed regarding the security and privacy of mission-critical and enterprise applications in the cloud. SYS-ED staff and CETi Technology Partners are evaluating the combination of software that will form the virtual infrastructure required to set up both private and public cloud deployment: trusted and encrypted infrastructures and development tools required for a successful implementation of a cloud environment.

Unlike the investment in commercial information technology infrastructure which in many situations has been developed and implemented over a half century as part of the modern era of data processing, these new technologies, may not be categorically or immediately better than a web-enabling and retrofitting of an existing applications and system software. The storage, delivery, and processing of data can be selected from or be a combination of cloud computing, traditional outsourcing, and in-house personnel. The hardware, software, and service technologies will be determined by budgetary constraints, competitive forces in the market, and regulations imposed by international governing bodies. The degree of successful implementation of cloud computing will be highly dependent upon the ability of an enterprise to train its employees.

Footnote 1:

The forecast was based upon network data collected by Cisco Systems from 10 enterprise and Internet data centers over a 12 month period.

Sources:

Reuters as reported in the Online New York Times - November 29, 2011 Nicola Leske

Forrester Research is a leading information technology market research company. Principals at SYS-ED have found it to be a reliable source of identifying emerging trends in hardware and software technology.