November 16, 2014
Cloud Computing: Number of Data Centers To Decline After 2017
Grazed from Sci-Tech. Author: Shirley Siluk.
hanging IT needs will drive more enterprises away from in-house data centers to off-site facilities in coming years, according to a new forecast from the analyst firm IDC. The future will also see a rise in super-size "mega datacenters," leading to a decline in the overall number of data centers around the world even as total data center space keeps growing, the report stated.
According to the IDC forecast, released earlier this week, the total number of data centers will peak at 8.6 million in 2017 and then start to decline. However, total data center space will increase globally, rising from 1.58 billion square feet in 2013 to 1.94 billion square feet by 2018…
Marc Crespi, CEO of OneCloud Software , came by to introduce his company and its product, OneCloud Recovery (OCR). OCR is designed to integrate virtual data centers created on-premise and move them to Amazon’s Web Services (AWS). Doing this task quickly, reliably and manageably is the challenge OneCloud Software has had to face.
Toshiba and Cisco this week signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the aim of enhancing the progress of a new Smart Community by extending collaboration on new ways to utilize the Internet of Everything (IoE) to improve processes, productivity and experiences in manufacturing, transportation and city environments. The global collaboration is intended to bring together the Cisco Fog Computing network environment featuring Cisco’s network-wide security solution with the Toshiba Group’s endpoint management technology. 
The idea behind cloud computing, as pioneer Amazon Web Services believed when it launched its first utility compute and storage products eight years ago, is to abstract away the underlying hardware and provide raw resources to programmers for applications to run on. This hardware is a competitive advantage for AWS, as it has been for its parent online retailer, and that is why AWS very rarely talks about its datacenters and systems. But with Google, Microsoft, and IBM all talking up their investments in cloud and the innovations they have come up with, Amazon has to lift the veil a bit.
A new IBM Institute for Business Value survey of 750 technology executives revealed 71 percent of respondents recognized that IT infrastructure "plays an important role in enabling competitive advantage or optimizing revenue and profit."
Cloud computing offers both unique advantages and challenges to government users. The advantages are well-advertised: Greater efficiency, economy and flexibility that can help agencies meet rapidly changing computing needs quickly and cheaply while being environmentally friendly.
One of the things about Microsoft’s (MSFT) cloud computing strategy that isn’t always fully appreciated is the enormity of the ecosystem being built around Windows services in the cloud. For example, with the recent addition of Rackspace to the number of cloud service providers running the same core Microsoft Cloud OS platform now extends to well more than 100 different companies.
The market recognizes AWS and Google as the leaders in cloud computing. However, because of its range of cloud capabilities up the stack, AWS is currently leading the race. But that doesn’t mean it’s the right choice for your company. One way to decide is to compare both clouds on price, global reach and capacity. And even then, it may be difficult to settle on AWS, Google or both.