Cloud, mobile cloud and social cloud: how the IT tail will wag the business dog

February 16, 2012 Off By David

Grazed from ITWire.  Author: Stuart Corner.

Research firm Frost & Sullivan is predicting that the synergies of these trends will upend the existing relationship between technology and business such that developments within the ICT sector will increasingly drive business process change, in some instances forcing the creation of new business models.

"This shift in relationship is already evident in the media, retail, travel and hospitality industries and will become widespread across other sectors in the coming 12 months," F&S said.

F&S analysts at the company’s 2012 ICT Outlook briefing said that executives in all industries would need to closely monitor the activities of technology firms, particularly leaders such as Apple, Amazon, Google and Facebook, to assess how developments in these trends might impact their operations…

"Consider the effect of mobile payment products such as Google Wallet, which are enabling technology firms to compete with financial services firms and which will change the way people spend money," says Andrew Milroy, vice president – ICT research Asia Pacific.

Within the enterprise F&S predicts the emergence of a new environment powered by the cloud with applications delivered via the software-as-a-service model to virtualised desktops.

"As distinctions between fixed and mobile communications erode and the workplace becomes device-agnostic, the concept of ‘bring your own device’ will become readily accepted. Tablet adoption, which witnessed good growth in 2011, will continue to expand within the enterprise as the devices are used for e-mail, collaboration and video."

Also, the move to the cloud will require significant change within the ICT channel, F&S warns. ICT practice research director, Audrey William, said: "Resellers and system integrators who rely on license fees and box shifting are likely to face extreme challenges. Traditional services margins are already thinning so there is an urgent need for the channel to re-invent itself.

"The cloud will bring new opportunities but to capitalise on them, resellers and systems integrators are going to have to find different ways of adding value for clients."

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