Grazed from Information Week.  Author: Thomas Claburn.

If cloud computing were marketed as a medicine, it would be a wonder drug. Its healing powers would be so great that the cautious consumer might suspect quackery.

But Microsoft insists the cloud can cure a bleeding wallet, a perennial concern among small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs).

The company’s Trustworthy Computing Division recently surveyed SMBs–companies with between 100 and 250 PCs, some who use cloud computing, and some who don’t–in the United States, India, Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Singapore.

Among the U.S. organizations surveyed–93 cloud, 94 non-cloud–Microsoft found that SMBs relying on cloud services feel three to five times better about IT costs, IT value, and IT security than those who shun the cloud…

Grazed from 4-Traders.  Author: Editorial Staff.

SingTel also awarded renewal of cloud services bulk tender for the supply of public cloud services

Singapore, 15 May 2012 – Singapore Telecommunications Limited (SingTel) today announced that it has secured two key tenders awarded by the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA) to accelerate the Singapore Government’s adoption of cloud computing.

i. G-Cloud for Whole-of-Government

SingTel has been awarded a five-year tender to deploy a private cloud computing infrastructure on a whole-of-government basis. To be rolled out by the end of 2012, the G-Cloud marks the first private cloud infrastructure to be developed on such a scale to cover all government bodies in Singapore. SingTel will provide and maintain G-Cloud for an initial five years with the option for renewal of a further five years…

HP Cloud Services, created with OpenStack technology, is an open-source development architecture that provides storage in the cloud for developers and organizations developing Web applications. It includes a management console, which provides analytics into demand patterns, operational performance, and resource use. OpenStack, founded by NASA and Rackspace Hosting, is a free cloud computing platform created by developers and cloud-computing technologists.

HP Cloud Compute provides customizable, scalable virtual servers accessible from any device with Web access. It includes software, control panels, and RESTful application programming interfaces (APIs) to let users run instances and manage the cloud according to their organization’s needs. Appropriate Cloud Compute applications include large-scale data processing, basic Web applications, and multi-tier deployments…

Grazed from The Epoch Times.  Author: Joshua Philipp.

Worries of information falling into the wrong hands, whether in the case of a new film or important business data, are making companies wary of doing anything sensitive on the Internet. Hand deliveries used to be a way around this, but due to globalization, which has scattered employees across the globe, and fast turnaround times demanded by today’s market, this is rarely an option.

Companies are looking for new ways of sending data, and one, Rimage, may just have a solution with their new app, Signal.

The app works with most devices—Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android—and lets publishers control videos, documents, and other files even after they’re sent out by using cloud computing. The company sending out the files just needs to upload them, choose which devices they want to target, then anyone who has the right access will automatically get the files…

Grazed from IT World.  Author: Kevin Fogarty.

It has only been six years since the 2006 conference appearance in which Google’s Eric Schmidt’s reference to Google services as belonging "in a cloud somewhere," introduced the term in to common use and got Schmidt credit for coining it.

"I don’t think people have really understood how big this opportunity really is." Schmidt told attendees at a Search Engine Strategies conference. "It starts with the premise that the data services and architecture should be on servers. We call it cloud computing – they should be in a "cloud" somewhere. And that if you have the right kind of browser or the right kind of access, it doesn’t matter whether you have a PC or a Mac or a mobile phone or a BlackBerry or what have you – or new devices still to be developed – you can get access to the cloud.

There are rival claims, of course…

Grazed from Forbes.  Author: Joe McKendrick.

Are we there yet? Think of cloud computing as a continuum that stretches all the way from one-off projects — that is, companies simply moving some IT assets to the cloud to gain cost savings — all the way up to a game-changer that strategically leverages online resources to open up new markets or ways of doing business.

What does it take, then, to become a “player” in the emerging cloud space? Two experts in the cloud trenches – HP’s E. G. Nadhan and Switch’s Mark Thiele – recently provided some working ideals on evolving into a strategic cloud business. Nadhan expanded on my recent post about running 100% of your businesses in the cloud, while Thiele elaborated on the strategic vision vision necessary required to make cloud computing successful.

Consider these 5 essential questions to ask to assess how far along you are on the journey to becoming a strategic cloud business:…

Contributed Article.  Author: Michael Tweddle, Sr. Director of Product Management at Quest Software

The cloud has changed the way technology is viewed – there is no denying it. No matter what the service is, many IT organizations are looking to move to the cloud, but, along the way, run into “cloud skeptics” within their organizations who don’t trust the cloud and are not open to investigating the idea. In my role at Quest Software, I often encounter cloud skeptics who have concerns about moving their on-premises messaging and collaboration environments to Microsoft’s new Office 365 service.

There are many reasons someone might give as to why they are skeptical about moving IT services to the cloud, including lack of control; business continuity and recovery; security and compliance; data migration; and data protection. These are legitimate concerns that need to be addressed as you evaluate cloud vendors, but, I believe there is more to a cloud skeptic…