By John Dixon, Consulting Architect, LogicsOne

On Tuesday April 29^th, I participated in another tweetchat hosted by Cloud Commons. As usual, it was an hour of rapid fire conversation and discussion amongst some really smart people. This time, the topic was based around “cloud computing and the changing role of IT,” and there were some great takeaways from the dialogue.  Below are the six questions that were asked during the chat as well as a quick summary of my thoughts and the thoughts of the group as a whole.

1. How is cloud computing changing the role of IT?
2. Besides cloud, what other trends are influential in changing the role of IT?
3. What steps should the IT department take to become a trusted advisor to the business?
4. How should the IT department engage with the business on cloud purchases?
5. Should the IT department make reining in rogue cloud services a …

Last year, four out of every ten CRM systems sold were SaaS-based, and the trend is accelerating.

In the recent Gartner report  Market Share Analysis: Customer Relationship Management Software, Worldwide, 2012 published April 18, 2013 the authors provide insights into why the worldwide CRM market experienced 12% growth in 2012, three times the average of all enterprise software categories. 

Gartner cites demand they are seeing from their enterprise clients for CRM systems that can help acquire customers, analyze and act on customer behaviours, and increase all-channel management performance.  Big data inquiries are also increasing in CRM, driven by the interest enterprise clients have in getting more value from social network data and interactions.

Key take-aways from the report include the following:

• The CRM worldwide market grew from $16B to $18B attaining a 12.5% growth rate from 2011 to 2012.

• 80% of all CRM software in 2012 was sold in …

The Growth of Cloud Block Storage: Building Blocks in the Cloud

By Sue Poremba

Sue Poremba is a freelance writer focusing primarily on security and technology issues and occasionally blogs for Rackspace Hosting.

Cloud block storage is a new way of thinking about how you store files and organise content. It allows you to abstract your infrastructure away from the implementation details specifying what hardware and operating system you need to manage to host the files your applications and organisation use.

“Cloud block storage allows organizations to focus on their content and trust the details of delivering that content to an established SaaS provider. It functions like a hard drive accessible via the Internet,” explained Troy Carl, vice president and lead tech engineer with Faith Comes by Hearing, an audio Bible organisation that utilises cloud block storage for its recordings.

“Storing files and assets in the cloud is important because …

By Jason Bloomberg

In my role as a globetrotting cloud consultant, I continue to be amazed at how many executives, both in IT and in the lines of business, still favour private clouds over public.

These managers are perfectly happy to pour money into newfangled data centers (sorry, “private clouds”), even though Amazon Web Services (AWS) and its brethren are reinventing the entire world of IT. Their reason? Sometimes they believe private clouds will save them money over the public cloud option.

No such luck: private clouds are dreadfully expensive to build, staff, and manage, while public cloud services continue to fall in price.

Others point to security as the problem. No again. Okay, maybe private clouds will give us sufficient elasticity? Probably not. Go through all the arguments, however, and they’re still dead set on building that private cloud.

What gives? The true reason for this stubbornness, of …

Matthew Smith, UK director of business solutions, Software AG

Analyst houses IDC and Gartner are of the same mind: the age of the Digital Enterprise is upon us.

In IDC’s view: “For the past several years, the IT industry’s transition to the Third Platform, built on mobile computing, cloud services, social networking and big data analytics technologies, has dominated the annual Predictions…for 2013, IDC predicts the transition to the Third Platform will shift into high gear, as the industry accelerates past the exploration phase and into full-blown, high stakes competition.”

Gartner VP and Fellow, David W Clearley, puts it this way: “These strategic technologies are emerging amidst a nexus of converging forces – social, mobile, cloud and information. Although these forces are innovative and disruptive on their own, together they are revolutionising business and society, disrupting old business models and creating new leaders.

«As such, the Nexus of …

Who said government is stodgy and wasteful?

When it comes to cloud computing, government’s on the forefront—particularly when it comes to cloud-based email. The US Army, EPA, GSA, Interior, Labor, the USDA… they are all among the government organizations moving email to the cloud under Obama’s “cloud first” policy.

The US Department of Veterans Affairs is showing particular prudence by starting out with a relatively small, 15,000-mailbox pilot to make sure it’s properly addressing all the security, compliance, governance and cost-savings concerns that are all part and parcel of the email-in-the-cloud package.

Then, the VA will up the roll-out to 600,000 mailboxes to save what it hopes will amount to about $85 million in maintenance fees, support staff and aging hardware it will no longer need.

I hope other organizations regardless of sector are paying close attention.

Everyone wants to save a buck, of …

Guest blog by Nick John
Managing Director, FCP Internet Limited

There is a lot of hype surrounding the cloud and its delivery of software, storage and infrastructure over the Internet, but many businesses still view the technology as being too disruptive to implement.

And yet, by taking the time to understand this advanced technology, we can begin to learn that the benefits usually outweigh the negatives, and that the myths are most often grounded in fiction. For that reason, we are going to debunk 10 of those myths.

Myth #1: It’s not secure. The cloud allows for your data to be remotely accessible, and so not in one specific location (such as a PC) where it can be stolen. The standard service-level agreement that should be in place is integral to finding the right security level for your business.

Myth #2: You have no idea what it is. Have …

Recent research by Nucleus put the focus on contact centres. Their claim was twofold – firstly that there was significant ROI to be had, but equally that choosing the cloud route allows for more cost-effective customer service – if not better customer service. 

Looking purely at cost, the case for the cloud-based contact centre is clear – the initial and ongoing costs are a fraction of on-premise options, for all the reasons that we’re already well aware of (software, hardware, staffing & resourcing). However, the claim that businesses who move from on-premise to the cloud are likely to recoup their investment solely through the savings on licences is a startling one.

More interesting, though, is the intangible aspect of moving your contact centre to the cloud – the aspect that says “your customer service will improve”. Isn’t this what we’re all looking for? Essentially, the means of delivering excellent customer service is …

Albert Einstein once said that the only source of knowledge is experience. And in terms of cloud computing, the latest report from RightScale, subtitled “How cloud maturity unlocks cloud value” emphasises that to a tee.

The second annual RightScale State of the Cloud Report, surveying 625 respondents from execs to cloud practitioners, found a wide array of interesting takeaways, but the key theme running through the research was that the more time you spend on cloud, the more revenue you’ll get out of it in the long run.

This graph shows in particular how companies with more stake in cloud computing were reaping the rewards:

“These findings show that cloud benefits are not only a future expectation, but also a reality today for many organisations,” the report stresses.

As shown in the graph, the report put companies into four levels of cloud maturity:

• Cloud watchers – organisations that are strategising …

Translating time into dollars matters far more to many CEOs I’ve spoken with versus what platform their applications are running on.

What matters most is getting all they can out of every hour their business is operating.  They are all focused on getting beyond the constraints that held their growth back in the past – everyone wants a growth accelerator today. 

For manufacturers especially, this includes applications with depth of functionality that can be quickly deployed regionally, and in more cases than ever, globally as well.  Line-of-business leaders want applications that make an immediate impact on their entire value chain.

Just having a cloud strategy is not enough for any enterprise software company anymore. Owning the pain prospects and customers go through daily to get work done is all that matters. 

Every application and platform component needs to contribute to the goal of reducing customer’s challenges of doing business …