Archivo de la categoría: DropBox

DropBox, Guest Post, Icloud, SpiderOak, Storage, SugarSync, Windows Live SkyDrive

Industry Dynamics of Online Storage and the Decade Ahead

Guest Post by Eric Greenwood

Eric Greenwood is a technophile whose interests have led him to study all things related to the cloud computing movement from online storage to software as a service. Get more tips and advice on his Cloud Computing blog.

Online, or cloud storage, is a massively growing industry, already poised to change the way we use our computers. By 2016, consumers are predicted to be spending as much $16 billion on cloud storage annually.

Big names are flying into the cloud. Oracle and Hewlett Packard are rushing to sell cloud computing tools; Amazon’s cloud services division has earned an estimated $750 million from cloud services in 2011 – and predictions are for earnings of $2.5 billion by 2014 from all cloud services including their Simple Storage Service. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos suggests potential for Amazon Web Services could surge to match that of its retail earnings, which last year topped $25 billion. Rackspace’s cloud servicing is also surging.

While currently only approximately 10% of global spending IT goes to cloud computing, the shift to cloud storage is a growing trend and market.

Popular cloud storage service Dropbox already has over fifty million users, and $250 million in venture capital; and Google Drive’s new online storage is poised to rival them. Like Dropbox’s chief competitor, Sugar Sync, Drive offers 5 GB of free storage, over doubling the free storage amount provided by Dropbox.

Storage competitors are also likely to follow Dropbox’s option of gallery pages that allow users who follow a link to see photos, presentations and videos without downloading each individual file. Dropbox is valued at approximately $4 billion, currently. The company’s CEO recently turned down a reported nine-figure offer from Apple. Apple of course maintains its own online storage system, iCloud, free to all users of iOs5. iCloud’s seamless interface with Apple products keeps this cloud storage service somewhat above the competitive fray.

Dropbox was recently voted “startup of the year,” and is reportedly the fifth most valuable web start-up, globally. But along with iCloud, SugarSync, and Google’s new drive, competition is fierce from other online storage startups ranging from Box.net, now known simply as Box, to Microsoft’s massive SkyDrive, Carbonite, which offers solid data backup services, and SpiderOak, which offers data encryption. Each of these cloud storage companies have greatly benefitted from the decline in pricing for online storage. Clearwell Systems research estimates that the storage cost for 1 gigabyte of information that cost $20 in 2000 is now approximately ten cents. HTML 5 has also greatly accelerated the growth of cloud storage companies. The cost and technology trends that have made cloud computing expand will only accelerate over the next ten years.

Dropbox’s popular rival SugarSync is an outgrowth of Sharpcast, the 2006 creator behind Sharpcast Photos, utilized for synching photo images to multiple devices. SugarSync’s differentiation with its competitors is based on its use of an automated refreshing process which means users don’t need to update their own synced files.

Microsoft’s recent overhaul of its SkyDrive online storage has doubled the storage file limit size, and made sharing as well as file management simpler for users. Just last month, Microsoft released a desktop app for SkyDrive, and allows direct file sharing to Twitter.

On the downside, there may only be a finite amount of users willing to store their data in the cloud, and a lot of competitors vying for a slice of the same pie. What’s good for consumers in terms of free storage or service perks may be difficult to sustain an entire industry of cloud storage competitors. Consolidation of some companies may be necessary.

A recent cautionary note was also founded when the file storage and hosting business Megapuload in Hong Kong was shut down by the U.S. Justice department for assisting in the violation of U.S. copyrights due to the ability of users to upload copyrighted material and distribute a link to it.

Megaupload’s violations bring up a key point in cloud storage, leading to the question as to whether or not Microsoft, Google, Dropbox, and all their competitors must scan files for copyright violations. Should this occur, the market will likely improve for Google with its Content ID already in place. Privacy and trust issues are also key in cloud storage growth. The only online storage company that claims to be unable to view users’ stored data is SpiderOak.

Online storage may be still in a speculative stage, but with data volumes predicted to multiply over forty times by the year 2020, data storage in one form or another is not only here to stay, it’s here to grow. Publicly traded companies such as EMC Corporation, NetApp, Isilon, Amazon, and CSC are providing expanded cloud storage options, and growing in financial leaps and bounds. IBM is working on a cloud system that can create virtual machines, able to integrate data without the costs of standard IT development, and simplifying cloud resources.

Complete data management through the cloud is clearly coming in the near future. Personal computer users and businesses multi-national to mom and pop size, must address data storage. Cloud storage is the go-to storage of the future, protected from human error, disasters, theft, and hardware malfunctions.


Collaboration, DropBox, File Management, Google Drive, My Docs Online, Online and offline, Shared resource, Syncplicity

Syncplicity Launches Group Sync, Sharing Capabilities for Businesses

Image representing Syncplicity as depicted in ...

Syncplicity today announced the beta rollout of first-of-its-kind Group Sharing and Permissions features for business users. With the launch, Syncplicity is the first solutions provider to make it easy to share and sync folders across large groups of users within an organization, while allowing them to organize their files the way they want on their own computers and devices, and seamlessly collaborate from anywhere. By enabling group-based folder sharing directly from a user’s local file system on their computer or mobile device, users can more easily collaborate with dynamic cross-functional teams, freed from checking files into rigid organizationally-aligned file servers or dragging and dropping them into a new place to share and collaborate from. At the same time, the new features give businesses the security, transparency, compliance and manageability they require.

“Group collaboration can now occur without hassle, marking a seismic positive change for the industry,” said Leonard Chung, Syncplicity Co-Founder and Chief Product Strategist. “IT Administrators need a solution to the chaos and security headaches introduced by unmanaged and uncontrolled sharing through consumer-grade solutions. We’ve answered the call with innovative group capabilities that maintain the business-class administrative, mobile, and security features today’s organizations require, while enabling users to safely and automatically sync and share files and folders easily on a large scale.”

Syncplicity speeds access to shared files and eliminates information silos by ensuring everyone in a group has seamless online and offline access to files in shared folders without the burden of sharing them with each new group member. With the new Group Sharing functionality, Syncplicity users and Admins can easily share folders with pre-defined, centralized groups of users along with individuals. Every member of the group gains immediate access to all the files in the shared folders and organizes them however they prefer on their own computer. As new users join the group the shared folders are automatically synced to their computers. And, when users leave the group they automatically lose access to those folders and the files can be automatically wiped from their synced locations for additional security.

Syncplicity’s Group sharing also dramatically reduces the time and cost of supporting users and protecting company data. As new users are added to the system, IT Administrators can easily add them with groups, giving group members immediate access to all folders, including shared folders from corporate file servers. This reduces end-user file server connectivity and permission issues and reduces the support cost of VPNs. Because groups are centrally managed, users who are removed from a group lose access to shared folders and files associated with that group immediately.

Additional key features of the Syncplicity group sharing and permissions beta include:

Admins can create an unlimited number of groups and easily add users
Admins can avoid complexity and uncertainty by having constant
visibility into what folders have been shared with the group and what
users are members of each group
Admins can share folders from on-premise file servers so members of
the group get online, offline, and mobile access to those folders
without having to map drives or configure a VPN
Folders can be shared with “read only” or “read-write” access to
protect files from inappropriate changes; Syncplicity determines an
individual user’s access rights based on permissions granted through
group membership and individual shares (e.g. a user can be granted
read-write access individually even if they belong to a group that
just has read-only access)
As an added protection, Syncplicity prevents data loss by not allowing
any user to permanently delete files unless they are the original owner
Synced group folders can be accessed online and offline— if offline,
changes are synced to the group as soon as the user connects and
Syncplicity automatically handles version conflicts

Syncplicity customers interested in participating in the beta program can register at https://syncplicity.wufoo.com/forms/m7x1s1/ for additional details.