SilkRoad Technology, the aptly named competitor of, say, the up-and-coming Workday that peddles cloud-based social talent management solutions, has topped up its funding with another reportedly oversubscribed $35 million round.
That makes an incredible $162 million since 2003.
The latest money comes from new investors Keating Capital and NTT Finance along with existing investors Intel Capital, Crosslink Capital, Foundation Capital, Azure Capital and Tenaya Capital, among others. It’s supposed to support worldwide expansion and product innovation ahead of a potential IPO this year or next.
Archivo mensual: mayo 2012
Design Guidelines for Cloud Computing
Infrastructure as a Service and Platform as a Service offer us easy scaling of services. However, scaling is not as easy as it seems to be in the Cloud. If your software architecture isn’t done right, your services and applications might not scale as expected, even if you add new instances. As for most distributed systems, there are a couple of guidelines you should consider looking at. I have summed up the ones I use most often for designing distributed systems.
As Moore stated, everything that can fail, will fail. So it is very clear that a distributed system will fail at a certain time, even though cloud computing providers tell us that it is very unlikely. We had some outages [1][2] in the last year of some of the major platforms, and there might be even more of them. Therefore, your application should be able to deal with an outage of your cloud provider. This can be done with different techniques such as distributing an application in more than one availability zone (which should be done anyway). Netflix has a very interesting approach to steadily test their software for errors – they have employed an army of “Chaos Monkeys” [3]. Of course, they are not real monkeys. It is software that randomly takes down different Instances. Netflix produces errors on purpose to see how their system reacts and if it is still performing well. The question is not if there will be another outage; the question is when the next outage will be.
Cloud Expo New York: A Blueprint for Organizational Agility
We are a part of a dynamically connected world where consumers are rapidly adopting new technology and dismantling business models in their wake. Disruption, unpredictability and variability happen without warning. The challenge for any organization is to evolve, to adopt new architectures and processes that increase business agility, scalability and governance/compliance and decrease risk. While cloud is complex, the consideration and adoption process can be simplified.
In his general session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Kevin Hanes, Executive Director, Dell Service & Solutions, will talk about a pragmatic approach to realizing the potential of cloud today while building a strong foundation for the future.
The Cloud Is the Future
“Big Data eliminates the data silos that formerly existed, improving the depth and quality of analysis that can take place,” observed Scott Kinka, Chief Technology Officer at Evolve IP, in this exclusive Q&A with Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan. “Without these barriers, Kinka continued, “we gain access to information that was never before available. We can see where there are underserved markets, opportunities, problems that need to be addressed.”
Agree or disagree? – «While the IT savings aspect is compelling, the strongest benefit of cloud computing is how it enhances business agility.»
Scott Kinka: Agree and disagree. You can’t really separate the two. Here’s why: agility is the ability to not buy more than you need. It is the ability to add resources when you need them rather than having to overspend and overbuy upfront on the idea that one day you might need more.
Xerox, CHOICE Administrators Team to Deliver Health Insurance Exchanges for States
Xerox has formed an alliance with CHOICE Administrators Exchange Solutions in all 50 states to offer a comprehensive, secure, cloud-based Health Insurance Exchange (HIX) solution. States can begin implementing and customizing the solution today with confidence that the HIX will be fully operational for October 2013 enrollments and for January 2014 coverage effective dates, the deadlines set by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
“Our discussions with states show that the majority want to make health reform as state-specific as possible and to maintain control over their HIX rather than defaulting to the federal solution,” said Kevin Counihan, president, CHOICE Administrators Exchange Solutions. “As the certification deadline gets closer, it’s increasingly important for states to consider a comprehensive solution that doesn’t require building a product and allows time for customization. States can tailor their HIX solution developed by Xerox and CHOICE to meet the needs of their residents and small businesses and be sure their HIX is ready on time.”
CHOICE Administrators Exchange Solutions delivers the framework of the HIX Solution Suite, a software-as-a-service cloud-based platform, which allows participants to make informed enrollment decisions while providing their sponsoring employers the infrastructure to maintain affordable budgets. Xerox provides the business process and technology solutions to help states operating a HIX handle massive amounts of information quickly, efficiently and securely on behalf of millions of people.
“Xerox has more than 40 years of experience working with state governments,” said Kevin Walsh, vice president, Healthcare Eligibility and Insurance Exchange Services, Xerox. “Our expertise, knowledge of the marketplace and partnership with CHOICE positions us well to support the HIX design to increase access to health coverage for consumers.”
SHI Coupon Code ▸ shiVIPgold Special Offer as Cloud Expo Sponsor
As the Diamond Sponsor of Cloud Expo New York, SHI International is offering special passes to SYS-CON’s 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York.
Founded in 1989, SHI International Corp. is a global provider of technology products and services. Driven by the industry’s most experienced and stable sales force and backed by software volume licensing experts, hardware procurement specialists, and certified IT service professionals, SHI delivers custom IT solutions to Corporate, Enterprise, Public Sector, and Academic customers. With over 1,800 + employees worldwide, SHI is the largest Minority/Woman Owned Business Enterprise (MWBE) in the U.S. and is ranked 19th among Everything Channel’s VAR 500 list of North American IT solution providers.
Nvidia Claims Cloud GPU
Nvidia Tuesday unveiled a VGX platform – reportedly the result of five years of effort – that it called the world’s first virtualized GPU meant to accelerate graphics from cloud computing centers.
IT departments are supposed to use it to deliver virtualized desktops with the graphics and GPU performance of office PCs or workstations to employees using any connected and BYOD devices regardless of operating system including thin clients, laptops, tablets and smartphones.
The dingus, an enterprise implementation of the company’s new Kepler GPU, is also supposed to work with 3D design and simulation tools previously deemed too intensive for virtualized desktops.
Nvidia claims the platform “delivers an experience nearly indistinguishable from a full desktop while substantially lowering the cost of a virtualized PC.”
Quantifying Reputation Loss from a Breach
It’s really easy to quantify some of the costs associated with a security breach. Number of customers impacted times the cost of a first class stamp plus the cost of a sheet of paper plus the cost of ink divided by … you get the picture. Some of the costs are easier than others to calculate. Some of them are not, and others appear downright impossible.
One of the “costs” often cited but rarely quantified is the cost to an organization’s reputation. How does one calculate that?
Well, if folks sat down with the business people more often (the ones that live on the other side of the Meyer-Briggs Mountain) we’d find it’s not really as difficult to calculate as one might think. While IT folks analyze flows and packet traces, business folks analyze market trends and impacts – such as those arising from poor customer service.
UK’s G-Cloud may struggle to hit targets, says report
A report from VMware has revealed the adoption of G-Cloud is not progressing as expected with many senior public sector IT staff sceptical about the process.
VMware interviewed nearly 200 IT heavyweights about G-Cloud, the UK government’s cloud service which will attempt to reduce IT costs by £200m per year and have 50% of IT spending coming through public cloud services.
Yet there wasn’t universal agreement on whether these targets will be hit, with only 30% saying the £200m cost-saving was attainable and a whopping 63% saying the government would struggle to achieve their plan of half IT spending through the cloud.
Overall consensus was that people were split on G-Cloud, with 45% of respondents saying they were in some way positive about G-Cloud compared to 41% who were indifferent or negative.
The Cloud Store – an app store launched in February designed to make buying IT services more …
Ex-Apple CEO says healthcare could be biggest beneficiary of cloud
18th May 2012
Cloud computing has the power to reinvent healthcare systems across the globe, according to former Apple CEO, John Sculley. In an exclusive interview with The Guardian, the 73 year-old Silicon Valley legend said he expected cloud to accelerate an overhaul of the current approach to healthcare within the next 15 years, and for big data analytics to be at the heart of the shift.