Category: News

Grazed from InformationWeek. Author: Charles Babcock.

VMware’s fourth-quarter earnings, reported Jan. 28, set a record and came in ahead of analyst expectations. The next day, its stock, which had been trading at $99.10 just before the announcement, took a stunning hit, losing 20% of its value within a short time after the opening of trading. Several analysts had predicted VMware’s fourth-quarter earnings would disappoint because the market for virtualization products was nearly saturated and Microsoft was moving in to steal the customer base.

Instead, VMware beat the previous fourth-quarter’s earnings per share by 2% — at $0.47 per share. But the news that it was laying off 900 and realigning resources was taken as a bad sign. Maybe the skeptics had been right about VMware’s diminishing future. Or perhaps lost in translation was the statement that VMware would hire an additional 1,000 people and focus on its top business priorities…

Grazed from V3.co.uk. Author: Dan Worth.

The lure of a takeaway pizza is well-known and thanks to technology it’s becoming ever easier to order whenever the mood takes you. Smartphones and tablets let us place orders from any location via dedicated apps and one firm that’s seen the rise perhaps better than any other is Domino’s Pizza.

It now sees over 50 percent of its orders placed online, and 20 percent are coming from mobile applications on Android and iOS devices, according to the firm’s chief information officer Colin Rees. Rees was speaking at Cloud Expo in London last week and explained how the firm has embraced the benefits of cloud computing to ensure it can cope with the growing demand placed on its ordering systems…

Grazed from FierceGovernmentIT. Author: David Perera.

Cloud computing adoption remains low among law enforcement agencies, according to the results of a survey unveiled Jan. 31. According to a Ponemon Institute survey (.pdf) of 272 officials, most of them chief executives of police or sheriff departments, 46 percent of law enforcement agencies are not considering utilizing cloud computing. Thirty-eight percent say they’re considering it, or planning for adoption within the next 2 years, and 16 percent say they use it now. Ponemon did the survey at the behest of the International Association of Chiefs of Police and cloud computing promoter SafeGov.

Cloud adoption in law enforcement faces the hurdle of meeting FBI Criminal Justice Information Services security policy standards (.pdf)–standards which the FBI says (.pdf) are "cloud-compatible," although acknowledging that "the requirements may be tough for some vendors to meet." In a high-profile case, the city of Los Angeles in 2011 reversed (.pdf) a Google Apps for Government deployment to its police department on the grounds of noncompliance with CJIS policy…

Grazed from PRWeb. Author: PR Announcement.

MGI Research, LLC announced today the general availability of MGI Cloud30TM Index data. “Cloud computing has emerged as one of the most dominant and disruptive trends in technology. It is one of the key tools in transforming enterprise IT and is the underlying enabler of both social networking and mobile computing”, said Igor Stenmark, Managing Director of MGI Research. "While it is unclear if cloud computing will deliver on all of its promises, the reality is that no technology project is undertaken today without evaluating the use of cloud computing.

The MGI Cloud30TM Index is intended to be the most accurate proxy of the financial impact of cloud computing – whatever direction it takes”, Mr. Stenmark continued. The current data for MGI Cloud30TM Index indicates that over the past three years, the cloud computing trend generated a distinct and above average impact in financial markets. The MGI Cloud30TM Index is comprised of shares of thirty US-listed companies that have the most direct exposure to cloud computing. Today’s announcement makes the MGI Cloud 30 Index historical data generally available.

For data access, licensing information, details on index components, methodology and weights, refer to http://www.mgiresearch.com. or contact MGI Research at +1 (888) 801-3644 or via email: mgicloud30@mgiresearch.com.

Grazed from TechCrunch.  Author:  David Strom.

Do you ever encounter delays in loading web-based applications and get impatient? Resulting from poor network latency, or how fast data is transferred from one location to another, these delays are frustrating to as end users, but are far more costly to Internet businesses that depend on lightning-quick web experiences for their customers. With the proliferation of cloud computing placing added demands on Internet speed and connectivity, latency is becoming a more critical concern for everyone, from the end user to the enterprise.

Pre-Internet, latency was characterized by the number of router hops between you and your application, and the delay that packets took to get from source to destination. For the most part, your corporation owned all of the intervening routers, so network delays remained fairly consistent and predictable. As businesses migrate and deploy more and more applications to the cloud, the issue of latency is becoming increasingly complex. In order to leverage cloud computing as a true business enabler, it is critical that organizations learn how to manage and reduce latency…

Grazed from CloudVentures.  Author: Editorial Staff.

Recently the USA Government announced a Digital Government strategy.

Our new white paper ‘GovCloud 2.0′ describes how Government Cloud Computing can provide an accelerating platform for implementing this policy, covering topics such as:

• Business Transformation – Harnessing social media and collective intelligence models to reinvent government to be more collaborative.

• Procurement Frameworks – Cloud procurement best practices, such as the UK’s G-Cloud…

Grazed from SciCasts.  Author: Editorial Staff.

Salk researchers have reported a how-to secret for biologists: code for Amazon Cloud that significantly reduces the time necessary to process data-intensive microscopic images.  The method promises to speed research into the underlying causes of disease by making single-molecule microscopy of practical use for more laboratories.

 "This is an extremely cost-effective way for labs to process super-resolution images," says Hu Cang, Salk assistant professor in the Waitt Advanced Biophotonics Center and coauthor of the paper. "Depending on the size of the data set, it can save over a week’s worth of time."…

Grazed from Business2Community.  Author: Matthew Ramsey.

While migrating to the cloud is ultimately intended to reduce costs and make it easier to run your business, not following the right steps at first can lead to the exact opposite. Ultimately, it is the risk of downtime, security of your data, and objectives of the cloud service vendor in question as your enterprise nurtures this ongoing relationship. A Statement of Work (SOW) should be developed from the start, with a focus on objectives, tasks, and deliverables. The SOW should also cover details on project management in a fixed price model.

A vendor often presents a special deal if an organization like yours signs a contract immediately. Signing a proposal is not the same as signing an SOW, as most proposals simply outline the services to be offered. These also do not break down the cost of services or list acceptable performance criteria. A proposal is just a legally binding contract, which could put your organization at risk if the services do not meet the qualifications for quality and consistency….

Grazed from Technorati.  Author: Geoff Simon.

Early Friday, Wisconsin based Widen Enterprises announced that its cloud-based digital asset management solution (DAM), Media Collective, will be adopted by WAGO Corporation, a German company that manufactures components for electrical connection technology and electronic components for decentralized automation technology. And the automotive industry isn’t the only one choosing to use cloud-based DAM solutions. From marketing, software, governments, and food industries, companies of all kinds are realizing the benefits of a more centralized digital media library.

Media Collective, which offers cloud-based asset management solutions, offers a centralized media library that companies like WAGO can use to manage all their digital media needs. In total, WAGO has over 18,000 individual products, each one with numerous images and other digital media attached to them…

Grazed from InfoWorld.  Author: Chris Kanaracus.

SAP’s burgeoning portfolio of cloud-based applications has prompted it to make some changes to its PartnerEdge program.  More than 500 partners who have relationships with SuccessFactors, the cloud HCM (human capital management) vendor SAP finished acquiring last year, will be added to the program during the course of 2013, SAP said this week.

Partners "now have the opportunity to tackle the fast-growing cloud market and offer best-of-breed cloud solutions and suites to their installed base customers and prospects," SAP said in a statement. SAP is also trying to make life easier for partners on the contractual side of things. A single deal will allow partners to sell all of SAP’s cloud offerings, rather than requiring separate agreements for each one, according to the statement…