Page 126 - How Cloud Computing Is Transforming Business and Why You Cant Afford to Be Left Behind

MANA GEMENT STRATEGIES F O R THE CL OUD R EV OL UTION

new Linux and Windows systems. Amazon can’t do that, so a
large number of enterprises that are interested in cloud com-
puting will have reason to look to IBM or elsewhere. Such a
data center will sacrifice some simplicity of management and
economies of scale in order to be able to host a variety of data
center applications. So far, IBM hasn’t drawn a road map of

how its cloud facilities will be architected, although it offers
some specific products that would lend themselves to private
internal cloud operations.
For the moment, we’re left with the generic term cloud
computing, whether Mark Hurd’s audiences like it or not. It
captures the notion of a widely available, low-cost service that
is available on the Internet, which is the ultimate network

“cloud.”

Data and Identity Security at Stake

In addition to etymological opposition, resistance on addi-
tional grounds may come from CEOs, chief security officers,
chief information officers, and/or database administrators, all
of whom will want to know how it’s possible to send the com-

pany’s most valuable asset, its data, outside the firewall.
The answers will emerge over the next two years as the
largest vendors and innovative start-ups tackle the problem. In
many cases, instead of solving the problem in its own labs, one
of the established vendors will buy a start-up with a piece of
technology that resolves some additional piece of the puzzle.

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