Simply, no. Not without trillions of dollars in investments to build up our nation's broadband capacity. Using the Internet as your "LAN" is pretty much DOA in this country unless and until every company can get affordable, reliable, high-speed, professional data-services (i.e. not DSL) at their location, 100% cloud is a myth, because the best business-case for the cloud is at the low-end of the spectrum, and they can't afford the quality-bandwidth to make it into a reliable solution. Very few small-business owners perceive that they can afford $1000/month for stable, reliable Internet services with an SLA guarantee attached, no matter what portion of the business relies on that application. He'll look at that and see ($1000/month * Forever) + ($CostOfCloudApps x Forever) as the model he's signing off on, and find a way to do it on his own equipment for far less.
Big companies can afford it, but have too much invested in in-house applications, datacenters, people, and the like, and aren't able to just "conform" their practices to some off-the-shelf solution in the "cloud," so even the portion of the market that can afford the infrastructure necessary to use the cloud correctly probably won't ever be "100%" cloud.
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Wherever there is a packaged product or service there is a great opportunity for the cloud: email, desktop backup, even some generic business applications. But, for in-house developed applications, the benefits of the cloud are not so clear. Probably, only a fraction of sites will consider moving into the cloud.
Cloud computing is good (less expensive) for dynamic applications (lots of provisioning and de-provisioning OR fluctuating loads) and small organizations (cannot afford to have expert in each required area). If organization is large enough to hire two or more (need replacement for holidays,sickness, etc.) experts in a particular area and the load is stable then in-house is the least cost solution. This description corresponds to a great many use cases such as ERP, sales, desktop, etc.
Examples where cloud computing is appropriate:
- Small organizations that are not big enough for in-house IT staff
- Resources for development and testing (could use in-house cloud)
- Applications that have peak demands such as selling Christmas decorations; filling out tax returns; launching new products.
- Quick deployment of a new application (brought in-house if application proves successful).
Examples where cloud computing is appropriate:
- Small organizations that are not big enough for in-house IT staff
- Resources for development and testing (could use in-house cloud)
- Applications that have peak demands such as selling Christmas decorations; filling out tax returns; launching new products.
- Quick deployment of a new application (brought in-house if application proves successful).
Cloud is highly attractive for many apps but not forever... think of the mobile app developer with a new offer. Is the new app going to be downloaded 5 times or 5 million times during the first week of launch?
Cloud is a must to help prepare for the unpredictable load and requirements, but as time passes and the success becomes more level and constant, many enterprises and developers will often bring it back in house (either colo/hosting/virtual machine) rather than keeping it in the cloud to keep costs under control.
Cloud is a must to help prepare for the unpredictable load and requirements, but as time passes and the success becomes more level and constant, many enterprises and developers will often bring it back in house (either colo/hosting/virtual machine) rather than keeping it in the cloud to keep costs under control.
Over the last 3 years we have migrated to 100% cloud - although we have gone beyond the cloud and call it sky IT.
Although only a small company (one location + some work at home, around 80 total users) we are an example of the future. In fact, since the management have worked for the biggest companies, we know that if we were a big company we could have done the same things at even lower unit cost and had the leverage to get the customization we have to live without.
In five years, no in house organization will be able to compete with the base services from MS, Google, Amazon, ... So, come and join us beyond the cloud; up here the deep blue sky looks beautiful every day.
Keith
Although only a small company (one location + some work at home, around 80 total users) we are an example of the future. In fact, since the management have worked for the biggest companies, we know that if we were a big company we could have done the same things at even lower unit cost and had the leverage to get the customization we have to live without.
In five years, no in house organization will be able to compete with the base services from MS, Google, Amazon, ... So, come and join us beyond the cloud; up here the deep blue sky looks beautiful every day.
Keith
There certainly isn???t a ???one-size-fits-all??? cloud. CIOs in both public and private sectors need to be empowered to chose the cloud that is going to best meet their needs. Whether its public, private or hybrid, the right way to go about picking a cloud solution is to, first, clearly identify what exactly you want to accomplish with cloud. And, second, how you plan to use it to accomplish those goals. Also, hype over cost savings or paranoia over loss of control shouldn???t drive decisions. Again it???s about knowing where you want your organization to go and then seeing which kind of cloud will get you there. I believe the number of organizations that go 100% cloud based will be in minority. ??? Sean Derrington, Symantec
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