Author: David

Grazed from CBR.  Author: Editorial Staff.

Majority of enterprises or 84% across Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) consider cloud computing to be a priority and 56% consider it a critical priority over the next 18 months, according to a latest study by VMware.

Nearly 31% of IT budgets in EMEA region are spent on cloud computing, up from 26% in 2010, as organisations look to empower a more agile, productive and connected enterprise.

The findings from its Global Cloud Adoption Study of IT leaders revealed respondents plan to spend almost one-third of their annual enterprise IT budget on cloud computing over the next 18 months…

Grazed from CPA Practice Advisor.  Author: Isaac M. O’Bannon.

Grazed from Computer World.  Author: Patrick Thibodeau.

Grazed from WSJ.  Author: Steve Rosenbush.

The economics of cloud computing are driving down the cost structure of business so far and so fast that it’s scary, Google CIO Ben Fried says.

“It deeply disturbed me … in 2006, 2007 consumer companies were forcing efficiencies on a scale never seen before,” Fried said Thursday during remarks at the Bloomberg Link Enterprise Technology Summit in New York.

At the time, Fried was working in the technology group at investment bank Morgan Stanley, where he was a managing director of application infrastructure, in charge of software development, electronic commerce and knowledge worker productivity. In 2008, he left the bank and headed to Google, which was at the heart of the disruption that was emanating from the consumer market and beginning to spread through the business world…

Grazed from PR NewsWire.  Author: PR Announcement.

KineticD™, known for its cloud backup and data recovery services for small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs), today announced that Network Products Guide, industry’s leading technology research and advisory guide, has named KineticCloud™ Backup a winner of the 7th Annual 2012 Hot Companies and Best Products Awards for Cloud Computing/SaaS. These industry and peer recognitions from Network Products Guide are the world’s premier information technology awards honoring achievements and recognitions in every facet of the IT industry. Winners from all over the world were honored in Las Vegas on Tuesday, May 8, 2012 during the 7th annual dinner and presentations.

KineticCloud Backup provides SMBs with the latest data backup and recovery technology. Specifically designed to ensure optimized data protection for PCs, Macs, servers and databases, KineticCloud completely automates tedious administrative tasks by simplifying management of backup software and schedules across all systems and business locations…

Grazed from Midsize Insider.  Author: Rick Robinson.

The Oracle Fusion Applications suite is available in two versions, hosted (and thus in the cloud) and on-site. So far, Fusion customers are showing a marked preference for the hosted version. Their experience may offer insights to IT managers at midsize firms in choosing between cloud or on-site options.

For all of the debate about cloud computing, the primary argument in favor of the cloud is that it provides greater simplicity and convenience to the user, including midsize business users. Oracle’s decision to offer Fusion in both cloud and on-site versions offers an unusually direct comparison of the two approaches…

Grazed from Wired.  Author: Cade Metz.

HP’s original plan was to build a cloud service using technology developed inside its very own HP Labs. But then Biri Singh arrived.

Zorawar “Biri” Singh was once the vice president of cloud computing at IBM, and he parachuted into HP in May of last year, grabbing control of the company’s new Cloud Services group, which was already developing an online service along the lines of Amazon EC2 — a service that provides instant access to virtual servers and other computing resources for building, testing, and deploying large software applications. HP’s service was already under construction using proprietary HP Labs technology, but not long after Singh’s arrival, it was moved to OpenStack, the Linux of cloud computing…

Grazed from CIO.  Author: John R. Rymer.

Cloud computing has reached an inflection point for enterprises — a comprehensive strategy for its use is now required. Until now, most companies had adopted cloud services in an ad hoc fashion, driven mostly by business leaders and developers looking to deliver new systems of engagement they felt could not be delivered by corporate IT — or in the time frame required. These ad hoc experiences prove that cloud solutions are now ready to be strategic resources in enterprise business technology portfolios. Only CIOs can help the business strike the right balance between the agility, efficiency, security, compliance, and integration that’s required for a successful cloud strategy.

This research introduces our Playbook approach to our cloud research, describing how to execute an enterprise cloud strategy from vision to planning to implementation through to ongoing optimization. It is the Executive Overview to our Playbook on achieving cloud economics, setting the context for 12 reports by Forrester analysts that address each major phase of the transformation…