Mobility and cloud computing are changing the way organizations work, and Microsoft is eagerly trying to establish itself in both areas. But some partners feel Microsoft’s rigid desktop virtualization licensing terms, which make it difficult for cloud service providers to sell its products, are slowing its progress.

Last week, Microsoft announced that OnLive, a cloud service provider that offers a Windows 7 desktop-as-a-service with Office apps, is violating its licensing terms. At the same time, Joe Matz, corporate vice president for Microsoft’s Worldwide Licensing and Pricing group, said Microsoft’s licensing terms are designed to "provide clarity and consistency for our partners."…

XPERTECHS, Baltimore’s leading provider of outsourced IT solutions, today announced it has ended Beta testing and added cloud computing to its service offerings to help local businesses take advantage of the benefits of this powerful new computing model.

“We are very pleased to be offering cloud services,” said Michael Mellott, President of XPERTECHS. “Instead of building and maintaining expensive IT systems on premise, businesses will now have the option of simply plugging into whatever IT resources they need, and only having to pay for what they use on a monthly basis. The cloud computing model is similar to the way businesses now consume and pay for electricity. After Beta testing for several months, XPERTECHS has on-boarded several clients in a full production mode.”…

With increasing acceptance of cloud computing by enterprise users comes increasing bandwidth needs, says a survey by Network Instruments (News – Alert), a provider of information and network management.

“While IT teams embrace cloud services and video conferencing as a way to increase cost savings and business flexibility, these technologies introduce new components and environments which make ensuring positive end-user experience all the more challenging,” Brad Reinboldt, senior product manager of Network Instruments said. “The reported lack of monitoring tools, quality metrics, and visibility create serious obstacles that prevent IT from effectively managing performance and jeopardize costly technology investments.”…

Salesforce.com, the enterprise cloud computing company, today announced its global Cloudforce Social Enterprise Tour, which kicks off in San Francisco on March 15th. Chairman and CEO Marc Benioff will deliver the keynote on the rise of the social enterprise at Cloudforce San Francisco, the largest Cloudforce ever, at Moscone West. More than 17,000 people are expected to register to learn how their companies can join the social enterprise revolution through social, mobile and open cloud computing. 3,000 developers are expected to register for the co-located Cloudstock, the industry’s first social enterprise developer event, to get hands-on and code the next generation of social enterprise apps.

 Free registration to attend in person is available at www.fb.me/salesforce or watch the keynote online and join the conversation with Salesforce Live! beginning at 8:30 a.m. PT at www.facebook.com/salesforce …

The cloud could suffer the same kind of collapses that plague the financial system, according to an analysis of the unrecognised risks of cloud computing.  The cloud is essentially a metaphor for a network of computers in which computational tasks and resources can be shared. 

The big idea here is that users simply rent the computing power, the storage or an application for as long as they need it without having to invest in the infrastructure behind it.   That makes computing cheaper, easier and more efficient…

Business leaders want to exploit cloud computing values fast, but they also fear the security risks in moving to cloud models too quickly.

Just at the time that companies want to leverage cloud, they know that security threats are growing. Indeed, according to recent HP-sponsored research, the volume and complexity of security threats has continued to escalate. Analyst firms such as Forrester place security and privacy as the top reasons for not adopting cloud.

Yet by better understanding cloud security risks, gaining detailed understanding of your own infrastructure and following proven reference architectures and methods, security can move from an inhibitor of cloud adoption to an enabler…

Depending on which survey or story you read, the cloud can be either a good thing for IT workers and their job security, or it can be terrifying.

For example, a study by Microsoft and IDC recently predicted that cloud computing will create 14 million jobs internationally by 2015. But those aren’t just IT jobs, they are jobs spread around the entire world, across all industries.

For IT shops, the news may not be as bright: A study by IT service provider CSC concluded that 14% of companies reduced their IT staff headcount after deploying a cloud strategy…

As I’ve noted a number of times, cloud computing promises both greater IT agility and reduced costs. No one disputes the agility issue. Compared to traditional resource deployment that can drag on for weeks or months, cloud computing offers the enormous improvement of a timetable measured in minutes.

On the subject of cost, however, there is no consensus. I discussed the subject a couple of weeks ago here. The other perspective made itself known last week with this opinion piece in InformationWeek. The author evaluated the historical price changes in AWS S3 storage vs. on-premises, disk-based storage and concluded that AWS isn’t cost competitive. Moreover, he asserted that AWS storage isn’t realizing (or at least, isn’t passing on) the benefits of Moore’s Law, since its prices aren’t dropping as rapidly as on-premises storage pricing…

Data integration software services company, Informatica, has adopted cloud-based ERP software vendor, NetSuite’s professional services automation solution to manage its worldwide services business.  Under the deal, Informatica has installed NetSuite OpenAir for project management, time and expense, global billing, resources management and reporting.

Richard Busch, director of professional services operations at Informatica, said the company had experienced significant growth over the past seven years, driven by growth in cloud computing and big data, and the demands placed upon Informatica’s services organisation have increased tremendously…