2010 – The year of the Cloud?

December 2009

Will 2010 be the year when “the cloud” finally delivers on the promise?

What in fact is cloud computing and is it really “the next big thing”? If you ask any number of IT professionals you are likely to get a variety of different answers!

I believe “cloud” computing is not new, but is a convenient marketing tag for the delivery of IT as a service over a network connection. Many people have been using “cloud” technologies for years without realising it. There are many types of cloud, from public, where resources are shared, to private, where resources are dedicated to one customer.

The underlying technologies that enable cloud computing (virtualisation, networking etc) seem to have reached a level of maturity where suppliers are able to provide the services with reliable service levels.

So will organisations adopt the cloud? It is certainly a way of delivering flexible services which might well suit an economy coming out of recession. A recent survey by Easynet showed that 73% of SME’s plan to adopt cloud technologies in the next 5 years. This compares with less than 50% a year earlier.

Therefore SME’s certainly appear to be “warming” to the cloud quite quickly. But will 2010 be the year of mass adoption? I don’t think so, because I think it will take many organisations a long time to disentangle their current IT investments and therefore I expect a phased adoption of cloud technologies over the medium term. This may well disappoint many suppliers who have invested heavily in the cloud, so watch out for some good deals as suppliers try to recoup their investments.

Mike Hill – Head of Commercial Services – Itica Consulting – December 2009

mike.hill@itica.co.uk

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