Grazed from Trefis. Author: Morgan Smith.

Over the past several years, technology has taken some giant leaps forward in terms of allowing businesses to better engage with their employees, customers, and competitors – and one of the biggest keys in providing companies with the means to do so is cloud computing. The term cloud computing – a concept that was unknown to the majority of the planet until just a few short years ago – has today become almost a household name.

In this article, I will discuss how the current and future need by large and small companies, as well as by individuals, has helped in transforming the businesses that both provide cloud computing and allow for the usage of cloud computing capabilities – and in turn may lead to a great opportunity for investors…

VMware, Inc., the global leader in virtualization and cloud infrastructure, today announced new research findings that demonstrate public cloud adoption has moved beyond test and development in many companies. The study, commissioned by VMware and conducted by analyst firm Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG), found 67 percent of the mid-market and enterprise companies surveyed are running what they view as mission-critical workloads on Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS).

"The study demonstrates that IaaS from cloud service providers is seeing broad adoption by mainstream business for business-critical applications and data, moving beyond test and development," said Mathew Lodge, vice president, cloud services, VMware. "As IaaS adoption grows, so does the importance of strong customer service and support as well as the quality of the underlying technology. Compatibility with existing virtualized datacenters and private clouds was also key."

Grazed from CUTimes. Author: Natasha Chilingerian.

Pano Logic, the provider of the end-to-end, virtual hardware and software desktop solution Pano System, has gone out of business, according to the company’s former public relations firm.

The shutdown comes shortly after the company announced a PC replacement project with the $3.4 billion Redstone Federal Credit Union in Huntsville, Ala. Redstone FCU had been in the process of replacing 75% of its PCs with Pano Logic’s virtual desktop computing solutions and planned to continue the project into 2013…

Grazed from ZDNet. Author: Mary Jo Foley.

Microsoft has gone store-happy this year, debuting a Windows Store for Windows 8 and Windows RT; an Office Store for Office 2013; a SharePoint Store for SharePoint Server 2013; and a renamed Windows Phone Store (formerly the Windows Phone Marketplace).

On October 31, Microsoft added another new store to its list: A Windows Zzure Store where it will allow its cloud-computing customers to purchase third-party apps and services through the Azure management portal…

Grazed from ReadWrite Cloud. Author: Brian Proffitt.

In the age of cloud computing, it’s an archaic thought: The livelihood of some popular websites currently rests on bucket brigades carrying diesel fuel up multiple flights of stairs just to keep generators running. But that’s the reality as Lower Manhattan struggles with massive power outages and flooded understructures in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. It’s a decidedly 17th Century solution to a 21st Century problem. But it’s the only way to get fuel to generators that are located in powerless high-rises when elevators are out of service and basement fuel pumps are incapacitated due to flooding?

For site admins at Fog Creek Software in New York, the solution is clear, albeit arduous: When diesel is delivered to their building at 75 Broad Street, the fuel is hand-delivered to the generators on the 17th floor via bucket brigade, giving the online service provider more hours of uptime while basement flooding is cleared and the building awaits power restoration from ConEd. Meanwhile, users of services like Trello, FogBugz and Copilot are basically in a holding pattern, knowing that one missed fuel delivery or downed generator is all that stands between uptime and downtime right now…

Grazed from TechTarget. Author: Beth Pariseau.

Chris Weitz, a director at Deloitte Consulting LLP, is charged with leading the financial services consulting company’s team for advisory services in cloud computing. He’s been in this role for five years, and previously held a global consulting position with Deloitte for nine years. Overall, he’s been in the IT business for a little over 30 years.

Thus, cloud computing is hardly the first seismic shift in IT that Weitz has seen. And when it comes to cloud security and data privacy — identified by 49% of the more than 950 people polled recently by Deloitte at its Dbrief event as the most challenging aspect of implementing a hybrid cloud environment — he says the major cloud providers are better at it than most people think…

Grazed from UCStrategies. Author: Editorial Staff.

Cloud computing is playing a more important role in enterprises. By 2013, cloud services will comprise 10 percent of IT spending, according to IDC. The adoption rate could slow, however, over reliability and security issues. When Amazon Web Services experienced an outage last week, taking several major web sites down with it, concerns were once again heightened over the reliability of cloud services.

Cloud outages of hosting companies are rare but nonetheless raise red flags for enterprises considering migrating business functions to a cloud computing environment. Following several high profile outages, service providers selling as-a-service technology need to provide added assurance of reliability and security…

Grazed from BusinessWire. Author: PR Announcement.

D&B, the world’s leading source of commercial information and insight on businesses, today announced that it is providing the most comprehensive, current, and complete business data for in-house developers on Microsoft Corp.’s Windows Azure cloud computing platform, through the just-announced Windows Azure Store. D&B Business Insight lets users generate a list of companies from D&B’s global database of more than 215 million records, from criteria matched to their business needs. This high-quality data will give in-house developers and their customers the business information they need to capture new business opportunities and make informed business decisions.

Whether scoping the size of a market in a given territory, generating prospect lists, qualifying leads, building marketing campaigns or sourcing new suppliers, Windows Azure corporate developers and their customers can gain practical, powerful business insights from the new service. Business Insight is based on D&B’s API platform, D&B Direct…

Grazed from PRNewsWire. Author: PR Announcement.

TransparentBusiness.com, an online platform that helps to optimize performance, coordination and monitoring of virtual teams, was distinguished as a "Rising Star" in the category "Best Cloud Computing Solution for Enterprise" during the 14th edition of PC World Latin America Awards. The solution competed with five other cloud-based tools: SAP Sales on Demand, HP CloudSystem Enterprise, Microsoft Office 365, Citrix Cloud Platform and VMWare View 5.

Launched in April 2012 by KMGi, TransparentBusiness.com is a web application that allows managing and monitoring all computer-based work process. The system records time spent by each worker on each task and project, taking screenshots every three minutes and recording worker’s activity. It allows managers monitor their global workforce with the same effectiveness as if everyone were in the same office. Additionally, Transparent Business shows true status of each task and protects companies from over billing by external contractors…

Grazed from PRNewsWire. Author: PR Announcement.

The recent shift to Cloud Computing and moving document management operations to remote locations allows for reduction of costs. RemoteDesktopTwain 4 is a proven solution to connect your business capture software and scanners in a Terminal Server environment.

RemoteDesktopTwain 4 allows security using any local TWAIN compatible scanner via Microsoft RemoteDesktop connection. A scanner is used like it would be locally connected and does not require any leaning or setup. It works with most EMR, patient billing and medical software systems and successfully used by:…