Author: David

Grazed from The Washington Post.  Author: Marjorie Censer.

Vivek Kundra, the first federal chief information officer who became the face of the government’s information technology reform efforts, including shifting to cloud computing, surprised many when he left the government last year for a Harvard University fellowship.

He surprised observers again when after several months at Harvard, he took a job with San Francisco-based cloud-computing firm Salesforce.com. Kundra, now the company’s executive vice president of emerging markets, said he’s particularly interested in transformation related to social networking and the increased engagement the public expects from institutions…

Grazed from Yahoo.  Author:  Aurelia End.

Grazed from Business Insider.  Author: Julie Bort.

Thanks to Microsoft’s Windows 7 commercials, the term "cloud" has moved into the mainstream.

Most people understand that "cloud" refers to applications that stream from the Internet. But there’s a lot more to it than that.

The word "cloud computing" covers a bunch of technologies, which is why Forrester Research can say that the cloud was a $40.7 billion market in 2011 and will grow to a whopping $241 billion in 2020…

Grazed from QRCodePress.  Author: Editorial Staff.

In the world of mobile commerce, security is a serious issue. Many companies have begun investing and creating mobile applications that make mobile commerce possible. None, however, have been able to make an application that is adequately secure from hacking.

Even acclaimed technology company Google has failed to provide a resilient service. Cryptomathic, an electronic security firm, now claims that is has created the first secure mobile wallet platform. The company recently released the application to consumers worldwide…

Grazed from GigaOM.  Author: George Gilbert.

There’s a reason Larry Ellison called cloud computing “nonsense” in 2009 and why he still won’t permit Amazon-style metered pricing for Oracle’s  mainstream database and middleware. A traditional 11g database license that today costs $2.8 million up front would cost less than $9 per hour using Oracle’s mySQL on Amazon. (Keep reading to see why this apples-to-oranges comparison is valid.)

We’ve seen a similar scenario play out before — back when IBM mainframes ran mission-critical applications on legacy databases. IBM actually pioneered relational databases, but it was conflicted about selling the lower-priced, lower-margin servers needed to run them…

Grazed from TechTarget.  Author: Rachel Shuster.

Grazed from ResponseSource.  Author: Peter Job.

The IT industry is being transformed by cloud computing and 2012 is predicted to be the year this technology becomes main stream as the market for public cloud computing is set to reach US$5.8 billion by 2015. But the key challenge according to Peter Job, CEO at Intergence is how to optimise and fine tune an organisation’s infrastructure to best take advantage of the new technology.

Intergence is a leading independent IT Optimisation Consultancy and one of the suppliers of the UK Government’s cloud computing procurement initiative, G-Cloud. Peter believes more work needs to be done upfront before making the journey into the cloud, he explains, “Before jumping into the cloud, organisations must take a look at their current assets and review how they can be optimised.”…

Grazed from Reuters.  Author: Olivia Oran.

Demandware Inc, the fifth cloud computing-based software company to join the IPO wave since December, is expected to see strong pricing and trading during its offering next week.

The Burlington, Massachusetts, firm, which makes software businesses use to maintain their e-commerce sites, plans to raise an estimated $74 million during its IPO under the new ticker "DWRE" on the New York Stock Exchange. It plans to offer 5.5 million shares in a range of $12.50 to $14.50.

Demandware follows a string of successful public offerings from other cloud-based technology companies; all priced within or above their expected range, and then saw their shares soar…

Grazed from DataCenterKnowledge.  Author: Rich Miller.

With a growing focus on harnessing renewable energy to power huge computing clouds, will data center operators get into the energy business? Or will utilities entice cloud operators to build data centers adjacent to energy hubs?

Developer Craig Harrison of Harrison Resource Corp. envisions a project that brings together the ingredients to support either scenario. Working with IDC Architects/CH2M Hill, Harrison has proposed an “energy park” on 644 acres of land near the Colorado-Wyoming border, at the intersection of key fiber, power and natural gas infrastructure…

Grazed from V3.co.uk.  Author: Daniel Robinson.

Security firm Bitdefender is the latest provider to get into the cloud computing storage market with a service that lets PC and Android users store files remotely and sync them between devices.

Available now, Bitdefender Safebox offers three tiers of service, with a free plan providing 2GB of online storage.  Users requiring more storage capacity than this can opt for a 30GB service for £24.99 per year, or a 60GB service for £54.99 per year…