Canonical, the company that specializes in Linux distribution had big aspirations to become a dominant player in the mobile industry. Specifically, it wanted to develop Ubuntu-based smartphones and tablets. However, it looks like it’s given up those aspirations. According to Mark Shuttleworth, the founder of Canonical, the company will end its investments in the phone business.

Why?

Over the last few years, Ubuntu-powered smartphones have made sporadic appearances in the U.S and elsewhere, but they were never round to create any kind of substantial impact on users. Expectedly, this company had no presence or market share in this mobile market, even after years of development and investment.

Looking back, on February 19th 2014, Canonical announced that it has signed agreements with bq of Spain and Meizu of China, both smartphone manufacturers to develop and sell Ubtuntu smartphones to customers worldwide. To give you a perspective, bq is the second biggest seller of unlocked smartphones in Spain while Meizu is one of China’s successul high-end smartphone manufacturers.

Since then, a few versions were released but nothing fruitful came out of the investment. Considering this scenario, Shuttleworth believes that the company has to make some tough decisions for the future, and one of them is to completely close-out the smartphone arm of its business.

Likewise, Canonical will also discontinue the development of Unity8 desktop environment, and hence forth will go back to its GNOME desktop. This desktop was also one of the key components of Canonical as it wanted to create a single interface across all devices.

The disappointment in discontinuing both these products was evident in the blog post by Shuttleworth in which he laments that the company was unable to continue its aspirations because it is different from the expectations of the community and the cloud industry as a whole. He said that the company will continue to give free software as this would be a relief in the technology industry that is mostly dominated by closed and proprietary alternatives.

This brings up the next question – what is the company going to focus on in the future?

The company’s CEO and management believes that cloud and IoT are the future and these are the areas in which Canonical will put all its efforts.  Already, it’s worthy to note that most public cloud workloads and private Linux cloud infrastructures rely on Ubuntu for their operations. In addition, many applications in the areas of robotics, networking and machine learning also rely on Ubuntu to provide the underlying software components and structure.

Given this scenario, it makes sense for Canonical to focus on these areas, and to help fuel more growth and usage in both cloud and IoT sectors. In particular, focusing on IoT can help the company reap big rewards because for one, IoT is still in its nascent stages, and second, it may need an open software that can work across multiple devices. Canonical may be in a position to provide this underlying infrastructure if it makes the right moves.

In view of all these changes, this strategy may not be so bad after all for Canonical.

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Magneto Commerce, a company specializing in cloud commerce solutions, has released a new product called Magneto Digital Commerce Cloud. This product allows all business-to-business (B2B) merchants to handle their business requirements using cloud technology.

This is a good strategy by Magneto Commerce, considering that the B2B market is way behind in innovation and progress when compared to the B2C market. To fill this gap, Magneto Commerce has come up with this product. Announcement about this product was made in Las Vegas during the Imagine 2017 conference.

So, what do corporate customers get from Magneto Digital Commerce Cloud?

First off, companies can support other corporate buyers on many fronts such as commerce account management, price lists and so on. This will give them the necessary tools for processing online requests,  regulating workflow, managing inventory and so much more.

Another salient feature is that Magneto’s platform comes with APIs and extensions that will help it to integrate with existing systems such as CRMs and ERPs. This way, legacy systems can be combined with technology, so the life of existing systems is greatly increased.

In fact, this flexibility is an aspect that’s missing on many B2B platforms today. As a result, these B2B systems operate in their own ecosystem, and companies are forced to migrate their data and operations to the ecosystem of the products. This way, the existing infrastructure and the investments made in this regard go waste. With Digital Commerce Cloud, there is a possibility to increase the life of existing systems as they can be integrated with APIs.

To top it, this cloud product addresses many of the challenges faced by branded companies. Currently, companies face bottlenecks in the area of corporate management, where there are many layers when a sale is made to large corporations. The tools in this product make it easy to manage these multiple levels, and even streamline the process to make it convenient for sales managers.

Yet another cool feature that comes in Digital Commerce Cloud is intelligent inventory in real-time. Typically, most corporate clients face the problem of inventory management. They are either under-stocked or overstocked, despite all the different strategies such as Just In Time (JIT) inventory management. What this product does is it offers inventory intelligence in real-time, so a customer can know what item is available at any given time. Also, it can predict the likely demand for a product and with these two known variables, it’s always easy to manage inventory.

Besides, this product can help to manage backend integration and multi-channel support to ease some workload of B2B clients.

In all, Magento Digital Commerce Cloud can be the revolutionary product that helps to address many of the gaps that exist in the current B2B market. It’ll be interesting to see the response for this product, and also if it can truly revolutionize this market and bring it on par with B2C market in terms of innovation and progress.

In fact, we can say that the next few months are sure to be interesting for Magneto and everyone involved in the B2B cloud market.

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While many companies are looking to have a market share in the public cloud space, VMware wants to move away from it. This is why it sold its public cloud business called vCloud Air to OVH, a French cloud provider. Terms of the deal was not disclosed.

vCloud Air is a line of business through which VMware provided data center services to companies that run VMware’s server virtualization technology. Over time, it also extended this service to third party data centers, as a way of creating a new revenue stream.

Unfortunately, vCloud Air could not compete with AWs and Microsoft Azure, and this meant that vCloud Air was a big failure. With this product, VMware realized that running massive cloud infrastructure is best left to the experts, and it’s better off focusing on what it knows best, which is to focus on technology.

It changed its strategy last year to keep pace of the changing dynamics of the cloud business. It now wants to focus on software-defined infrastructure stack that is expected to deliver more value for its investment and at the same time, help the company to go deeper into the business of hybrid cloud. The line of products that’ll come for this idea is still not known and there is much skepticism around it. For now though, that’s the plan.

Keeping in tune with this strategy, VMware has sold vCloud Air for an undisclosed sum. This is, in fact, a good move as it can save the company a substantial chunk of money. Though this product gave the company a few million dollars a year, it’s nothing compared to the almost $7 billion the company earns every year. Also, the first set of servers for vCloud Air was setup in 2013, which means, this infrastructure is coming to its end-of-life. By selling it to OVH, VMware has passed on  the responsibility and capital expenditure of upgrading these servers to the buyer. To top it, VMware has even got some in the financial deal.

An added advantage with this sale is VMware has eliminated the conflict that arises between its own cloud and that of the 4,000 and odd servers that are owned by vCloud Air network partners that run vSphere-powered clouds.

This sale was expected on many fronts.  The growing clout of AWS, Azure and the fast-catching Google Cloud means that the public cloud space is heating up like nothing before. This also explains why companies like Dell and HPE couldn’t make a mark in public cloud and had to withdraw. The same is for VMware too. At least in this case, the timing is perfect as the company does not have to incur more capital costs.

So, what’s in this deal for OVH?

For starters, OVH is one of the leaders in European cloud market and this acquisition can helped it to consolidate its position. Another reason is OVH is looking to expand rapidly in the US and vCloud Air may give it a good entry point.

VMware will also continue to be a technology partner for OVH.

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Rackspace, one of the pioneers of cloud computing, has launched a new cloud consultancy service aimed at delivering professional consulting services to its clients. With this launch, Rackspace has officially started moving away from its cloud platform business.

According to an official statement released by the company, Rackspace has said that it’s new division is called Global Solutions and Services (GSS), and this division will specialize in providing customers with the knowledge and expertise to move their operations to public and private clouds.

This Texas-based company believes that consultancy is an integral part of the future because many companies are looking to move their data and operations from datacenters to the cloud, so they need the right suggestions to make appropriate decisions. According to Rachel Cassidy, the Vice-President of GSS, these services are not only targeted towards its existing customer base of small and medium businesses (SMB), but is also aimed to meet the needs of large enterprises.

It has announced that these services will be offered regardless of the cloud platform a client chooses. In a blog post, it claims that it has earned the highest level of partner certification from AWS and Azure. In addition, it has also entered into a strategic partnership with Google Cloud to become the first Managed Services Partner of Google Cloud Platform. With all these in place, Rackspace is all set to enter the world of cloud computing.

This move represents a radical change for the company considering that it’s been in operations for the last two decades and has specialized in providing technological and cloud-based services to the SMB and mid-market companies.

Rackspace’s addition of GSS was on the cards for some time. When Jeff Cotten took over as the new President, he promised to add more professional services to support public clouds, and this is probably the first big step in this regard.

This news comes on the heels of a decision to cut the workforce in U.S by six percent. Also, smaller reductions are being planned in its other global offices, subject to the local laws and regulations in this regard. The company had earlier announced that much of these cuts will come from administration and management sections, and this is being done to make the company more competitive in the global market.

The emergence of this service doesn’t means that the existing offerings of Rackspace including its management of OpenStack will be stopped. This GSS is simply a new addition to its existing line of businesses. Though cloud consulting is a lucrative business, it’s also very crowded. Many established companies are already gaining a fair market share here, so Rackspace may have quite some catching up work to do.

It is worthy to remember that Rackspace was acquired by Apollo Global Management for a whopping $4.3 billion. Considering the size of this deal, the management would not want to tamper much with its existing customers. At the same time, it’ll be interesting to see how GSS plays out for the company.

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Every major organization across all sectors are experimenting with cloud, and public libraries are no exception to this rule. Auburn Public Library is leading the way by using the Cloud Library platform to enable its patrons to access all the content they want.

Currently, the library uses OverDrive to give its patrons access to ebooks and downloadable audio books. However, they have to access it through a different website to listen to audio books. This can prove to be inconvenient because patrons have to search for the content they want on the library’s site, but have to go elsewhere to download or listen to it.

To overcome this inconvenience, Auburn Public Library is migrating to Cloud Library over the next few weeks, so users can download or checkout ebooks directly from a single site instead of going back and forth.

Cloud Library will be integrated with the library’s own system in such a way that patrons can access content directly from the library’s site, in addition to print content. Also, it will work in tandem with the library’s checkout system. Every time, a patron checks out a book, the system will prompt them to download the corresponding ebook or audio book.

To provide that, the library is working to have its entire catalog in print, ebook and audio book formats, so patrons can choose whichever format they want. Going forward, the need for more copies of the same book will go down, so the library can focus on expanding its collection. Particularly, it wants to offer patrons more back listed books, so they can enjoy a wide collection of content.

Library employees are currently busy marking each item in the library’s catalogue with RFID tags and barcodes that can be used with the new self checkout system. This checkout system is expected to become available by end of May while the Cloud Drive app is expected to be functional from May 11th onwards.

In order for patrons to start using this new system, they have to download the Cloud Drive app, as this will allow readers to read or listen to books right from their smartphones, tablets and even computers. Since this app is available on Android, Kindle, Nook and Apple devices, users should have no problem making this switch.

This move by the Auburn Public Library is another step forward in our digital lifestyle. The comfort and convenience that comes with reading or listening to a book for your personal device is unmatched, and this public library is taking giant leaps to make this a reality for its patrons.

The one downside to this plan is it won’t work with basic e-readers, and patrons need to mandatorily download the Cloud Drive app. This can be a spot of bother for those who’re not familiar with technology, especially the senior citizens. But, they always have the choice to borrow print books or they can take the help of library employees to download and install the app for them.

It’s hoped that other libraries follow suit to offer more digitized versions of books to their respective patrons.

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There’s no question any more about cloud growth. The many advantages that come with cloud have made it a preferred option for storing and accessing applications, and companies world over have begun to embrace it in a big way.

The SolarWinds IT Trends Report 2017 that was released on Wednesday shows the magnitude of cloud growth. It reports that 95% of IT professionals surveyed have said that their organization has migrated critical applications and data to the cloud.

This is significant in many ways. Firstly, it gives us an insight into the depth of cloud market. Though most of us knew that companies were adopting cloud in a big way, it’s still a surprise to see that 95% have some kind of critical application in it. This number signifies the growing trust that companies have in the cloud now.

Secondly, it shows how far cloud security has come over the last few years. Many reports released a few years ago show the reluctance of companies to migrate their critical applications to the cloud because of security concerns. Though these concerns are not fully gone, the fact that companies are considering a hybrid model to overcome these insecurities is heartening. This way they can leverage the power of cloud and at the same time, protect their assets.

That said, there is more room for cloud growth based on the statistics presented in this report. It states that IT budgets are not moving towards cloud technologies, as 69% of respondents said that companies spend less than 40% of their annual IT budget on cloud technologies. Another 45% of respondents said that their respective organizations are spending around 70% of their budget on traditional and on-premise applications.

These numbers mean that there is room for cloud growth, and also that hybrid infrastructure is emerging as the preferred model of operations, as businesses prefer to use both cloud platforms and on-premise datacenters to store their data and applications. The choice of moving to the cloud is believed to be based on factors such as the priority of applications, perceptions about cloud security and ROI

The report further states that 74% of respondents said that their organization had moved applications to the cloud, 50% had said that they moved storage and 35% said they moved databases. The decision to choose these migrations was based on return on investment (ROI). In fact, ROI is seen as the driving factor for deciding what and when should be migrated to the cloud.

What does this report mean to customers and client industry at large? First off, it’s a ton of positive news that can entice more customers to move their operations to the cloud. Another aspect that it reflects is the changing role of IT professionals within the industry. With such a rapid rate of cloud growth, there is going to be a greater focus on management and integration than pure development. It’ll be interesting to see how IT professionals take to this change.

Lastly, it shows the vast opportunities that continue to exist for cloud-based companies.

In all, there’s much to cheer from this report.

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