Amorphous concept that is now beginning to gain traction, companies have begun to turn to cloud computing as a viable supplement to or even a complete replacement for their traditional software licensing models. Developed specifically to provide you with valuable guidance on how to structure agreements that will balance the business benefits with the legal risks of utilizing cloud computing as an IT services model, ACI’s 2^nd National Forum on Cloud Computing will provide you with practical insights on how to tackle complex issues including data privacy, business continuity, standards of care and the allocation of IP risks in the cloud.  Speakers at the seminar will include counsel from Oracle, LiveOps, iTegris, salesforce.com, Microsoft, Citrix, Matrixx, Hewlett Packard, AT&T, Symantec, Pfizer, SoftLayer, Visa, Chartis…

The IEEE Computer Society hosted a group of Chinese government and industry leaders to share resources on cloud computing, a strategic technology for both China and the IEEE Computer Society.

Cloud computing, even while still in its beginnings has already proven its value. It is already setting up a pattern that demonstrates how it can reshape business processes. It is this breakthrough that lead many to believe cloud computing is a messiah but like any other technology, it cannot fix everything. In fact, it cannot fix many of the critical issues that are essential for business success.

The clouds have lifted at Oracle, one might say. In a series of briefings at the recent Oracle Industry Analyst World 2012, the software vendor set its sights on the cloud computing market, announcing a broad portfolio of products and services to enable public, private and hybrid clouds, in turn letting customers choose the right approach for them.

It’s a change in direction for the company, according to some experts.

"It wasn’t much more than a year or so ago that Larry Ellison was publicly deriding the notion of cloud computing as basically smoke and mirrors," recalls Charles King, president and principal analyst at Pund-IT Inc. "Mark Hurd claimed recently that Oracle did $1 billion in cloud services business in the last year. It’s interesting to try to sort out what the reality is from the public-relations positioning that’s going on."…

When Google Drive was initially announced to be integrated with ChromeOS-running machines, the general consensus in the media seemed to be that this functionality was going to harbor a new age of personal cloud computing.

I, for one, am not so sure.

It is increasingly apparent that the level of hype around cloud computing has reached new and dizzying levels, and personal and business storage seems to be the latest "hot" implementation through which the Glories of Cloud are proclaimed…

Many enterprises are reluctant to move critical cloud applications out of their own data centers and into the public cloud due to security concerns. Yet the same automated, consistent provisioning that is essential to managing either public or private clouds (as well as to the process of thinking through a cloud deployment) can also offer the fringe benefit of improving security.

Of course, not all cloud management tools work equally well with all cloud providers, nor do they all allow customers to manage their internal and external clouds as a single unit. Infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) providers such as Amazon, for example, typically don’t allow customers to tweak the network and storage infrastructure beneath the operating system, forcing customers to trust that level of security to the vendor.

And while some customers will trust outside certifications, such as Amazon Web Services’ Level 1 compliance with PCI DSS, others will choose to stick with a private cloud within their own firewalls, or create cloud environments at an external site using their own networks and keeping storage under their control…

Research released today by Microsoft Corp. shows that small and midsize businesses (SMBs) are gaining significant IT security benefits from using the cloud, according to a new Microsoft study in five geographies.

The study shows that 35 percent of U.S. companies surveyed have experienced noticeably higher levels of security since moving to the cloud.(1) In addition, 32 percent say they spend less time worrying about the threat of cyberattacks. U.S. SMBs using the cloud also spend 32 percent less time each week managing security than companies not using the cloud. They are also five times more likely to have reduced what they spend on managing security as a percentage of overall IT budget.

"There’s a perception that security is a barrier to cloud adoption," said Adrienne Hall, general manager, Microsoft Trustworthy Computing. "Yet when companies embrace and invest in cloud services, they find the benefits far outweigh previous concerns."…

In the wake of the recession, bankers have got a lot of flak by betting on dodgy investments while still managing to make million-dollar bonuses. However, there’s no denying that banking, especially of the retail variety, is a necessary ingredient of society. In poorer areas of the world where retail banking services are absent, cooperative banks have sprung up to meet this need. And cloud computing is having an impact there.

Wikipedia defines cooperative banks as follows – “Like credit unions, cooperative banks are owned by their customers and follow the cooperative principle of one person, one vote. Unlike credit unions, however, cooperative banks are often regulated under both banking and cooperative legislation. They provide services such as savings and loans to non-members as well as to members, and some also participate in the wholesale markets for bonds, money and even equities.”…

Mutual fund operators are beginning to use cloud services offered by NYSE Euronext, in its 10-month old launch of a platform for worldwide use of computing resources by financial firms.

The mutual fund operators are using the platform to develop and test applications, as well as, in one case, a laboratory for trying out an order management system, said Ken Barnes, senior vice president of the capital markets community platform in the cloud of NYSE Euronext.

He declined to name the fund complexes involved. His comments came as he discussed plans to launch an applications and services hub for its Capital Markets Community in the United Kingdom next week…