A recent post entitled "Five Reasons for the Cloud Computing Boom," by John Soat on Plug Into the Cloud, an InformationWeek's Cloud Computing Destination, surfaces further evidence that the cloud and all its glory, is here to stay.

He writes the cloud is "a bonafide IT phenomenon that points to the future of organizational computing."

Gartner, a leading research firm, recently released a cloud computing report that estimates cloud services revenue worldwide will reach $68.3 billion this year, a 16.6% increase from last year’s revenue of $58.6 billion. And the industry will experience strong growth through 2014, when Gartner predicts worldwide cloud services revenue will climb to $148.8 billion.

Soat goes on to outline the five factors he believes have led to the success and buzz around this "IT phenomenon."

1. The recession which has brought on IT cutbacks and the need for innovation ways to cut costs.

2. CFO's ability to forego capex investments in technology.

3. CIO's have embraced the tactical benefits of the cloud.

4. The general acceptance of outsourcing as an IT strategy.

5. Nicholas Carr's writing which outlined the cloud computing arguments and provides one basic message: IT should be looked on as a low-cost commodity.

Comments on Soat's blog post also point out that the distributed nature of the workforce in the recent past has also promoted the cloud.

I believe we are currently seeing the beginning of an all out adoption towards cloud, which comes on the coattails of the widespread virtualization adoption. As businesses small and large begin to strategically think about their cloud options we will see more and more adopt private cloud, public cloud, or a hybrid cloud approach. At BlueLock, we are seeing a lot of traction with new (startup) companies jumping straight into the cloud and larger companies dipping their toes further and further in.

In a previous post, I talked about the challenges of sizing a cloud computing infrastructure, specifically one for running Microsoft SQL Server.  Because it's the back-end for many corporate IT systems and also serves as part of a lot of internet-facing applications, Microsoft SQL Server is certainly one of the more popular candidates for consideration when looking to leverage Infrastructure As A Service.  It's not the only one, however, so understanding how to properly size a managed cloud hosting VM is important regardless of the application being considered.  Luckily, it's easier than one might think.  

The key is almost always completely understanding how the application is performing today and what hardware (physical -or- virtual) it's running on currently.

There are a ton of great tools out there to assist with these assessments.  Commercial tools such as Lanamark VReady, Novell Platespin Recon and Vizioncore vFoglight are popular candidates and there are many more where those came from.  VMware partners like BlueLock can even provide this information as a service offering using the VMware Capacity Planner tool which is an IT capacity planning tool that collects comprehensive resource utilization and compares it to industry standard reference data to provide analysis about what how much capacity is needed in a virtualized environment using Vmware Virtualization Technology.

One hidden gem that is often overlooked, though, is the VMware Guided Consolidation tool included as a feature of VMware vCenter.  Now a module within vCenter Server, it walks you step by step through the consolidation process  including automatic discovery of up to 500 servers, performance analysis, conversion and intelligent placement on the right host.  Even if you aren't planning on building your own private cloud and, instead, are looking to Cloud Computing Companies to run your virtualized workloads, the VMware Guided Consolidation tool can at least help you assess your current environment if you are a small or mid-sized business.  It has an easy to use interface and a more simplified approach than using hte full VMware Capacity Planner tool.

I remember quite vividly IBM's competition for SQL compliance on their AS/400 platform. 20-some years ago, databases had to be relational, tying together a vast sea of disparate columns. Relations between tables enforced a kind of consistency and normalization. No more brute-forcing random data into your corporate accounting system... now you had to obey the rules!

...or so the thinking went at the time.

Slowly, deep in the seedy database underground, seditious computer scientists sat stewing. They waited for the day when engineers realized that sometimes the process of normalizing data mutated it past the point of recognition. They knew one day some devious developer would see that relationships were too computationally expensive and slow. And one day... ah yes, one day... people would give up their crazy ad-hoc "Standard Query Languages."

While these computer scientists and software engineers were shoved to the margins by enterprise computing a few small companies took note of how well these rogue database systems scaled to the millions of users and petabytes of data. Lilliputian firms such as "Google," "LinkedIn" and "Facebook" started to lead a No-SQL revolution, running contrary to the dominant relational databases and instead storing mind-boggling amounts of data in non-relational tables and retrieving them faster than RDBMS' one-hundredth of their size.

Non-relational databases have become incredibly effective, especially when backed by a scalable pool of resources of a cloud computing provider such as BlueLock. If one takes a look at Redis - a powerful key-value store that can scale to a massive size - such a sense of scale quickly becomes apparent. By removing constraints one can get rid of building a huge number of indexes and instead deal out content quickly and efficiently. Craigslist has already leveraged Redis to an exceptional amount, and VMware sees quite a future in it as a platform as well.

If we take a step beyond we can see an entire landscape emerging: key-value stores such as Redis, Voldemort or Cassandra, hierarchical stores such as Zookeeper and tuple stores provided by JavaSpaces and Apache River. The number of choices seems to grow every day, and without a farm of servers it becomes quite a daunting task to evaluate which one fits your project best.

My recommendation is to take a step back and see which solution best fits the problem you are working within. Re-evaluate your needs and objectively ask yourself:

• What business or logic problem am I really trying to solve?
• How large is this data going to scale within a year? Are we talking about megabytes or petabytes?
• How fast does the data need to be retrieved?
• Do I really need to perform a bunch of ad-hoc queries? Or am I just looking up values based on their primary key?
• Which solution is easiest to deal with? Which makes the most sense to me?
• Do I need relational data? Do I need hierarchical data? Do I even care?

Once you build a matrix comparing each solution you will find some implementations quickly sink to the bottom and others become very tempting choices. Once you have determined a top list of possibilities, it is best to fire up a data store and write a few quick proof-of-concept test applications. A convenient way to do this is to login to your BlueLock vCloud Express account, spin up several virtual machines and load up an array of Linux boxes to test each solution out. Measure how easily the product can be installed and test how easily it can be scaled to multiple servers. Do some performance testing against sample applications on your own fenced network and watch your local resource utilization.

Very soon after you use your vCloud Express account to test the top candidates you should be able to feel one or two "fit" in a much more natural way than other solutions. For example, Zookeeper may be the natural fit for someone wanting to house a slew of centralized configuration data. At this point you can take the next step and test this alongside your web applications and judge more accurately the level of effort to get things running.

If at the end of this arduous process you still can't decide between a couple of top candidates do what I always do: pick the project with the best mascot. You simply can't go wrong.

Don't forget - once you select a data store implementation you can have your own scalable, elastic cloud to grow into. BlueLock can not only help you horizontally scale your data tier, BlueLock can also help design server layouts that best fit the sometimes eclectic world of non-relational databases. Whether it be heaps of disk or mountains of RAM to remain resident within, the BlueLock Enterprise Cloud can help your cabal of data power the next big thing.

Cloud computing (virtual cloud or "vCloud") is buzzing everywhere now, but what is it?  InfoWorld has a good article about "What cloud computing really means". I find it to be a rather helpful overview, here is a quick snippet from the post:

BlueLock Cloud Hosting lets you choose which cloud service works best for you (see this article from ReadWrite Cloud - BlueLock Lets You Customize Your Cloud Infrastructure).  Using the "Cloud" means choices, and using BlueLock gives you the benefits of choices. 

We are a hosting service provider in the cloud space. Some call it Infrastructure-as-a-Service, others call it cloud hosting.  Whatever you call it we manage, maintain and run the IT infrastructure from the operating system down so you don't have to.  What do you do with all that extra time? Focus on your core business!

Cloud computing has been getting a lot of media buzz lately. Words like virtualization, scalability, load balancing, and enterprise level solutions are hanging in the air.  Sounds like something for big businesses, running huge databases with complex applications.   How can cloud computing impact or be of value to the small business?  Is cloud computing just for the big boys?

Absolutely not!  Cloud computing is a dream come true for small business and start-ups.  Small biz has some of the same IT issues as the big boys, and in some instances the need for cloud computing services is even more critical for small biz.  Data loss could mean the death of your business. Security breaches might very well be the end of your enterprise.  Controlling your cost structure is often a critical break-point. 

First lets talk about scalability. What does this really mean for the small business?  It means that you don't have to purchase and maintain excess capacity.  The typical server utilizes about 20% of its resources.  Can you afford any sort of capital investment that is only 20% utilized?  Probably not.  Why purchase a lot of computing fire power that you will not likely use?  You can't afford the waste.  Run your data and applications on a virtual machine, you will be utilizing on average 80% of the capacity you are paying for.   If you think you are going to need greater capacity later, that's cool too. With Bluelock, you can scale up anytime you need to, for any increment you need, in hours, not weeks.  Our cloud computing solutions allow you to respond to the real time demands of your business, lowering your investment risk, and giving you greater flexibility.

The flip side is also true--hit a dry patch in your business, or perhaps in response to expected seasonal fluctuations, you can scale down your capacity just as easily.  No wasted investment.  No capital commitment. No idle equipment.  Total freedom in how much you use and when.  In its essence,  cloud computing offers a form of fiscal liquidity yielding a competitive advantage that your business just can't live without. 

flexibility, security, & possibly reduced capital expenditure…

By Jon Schackmuth

Savvy business owners looking to get in the cloud are looking for flexibility, security and reduced cost.

The underlying question is:  Can small and medium sized businesses find what they are looking for in the cloud at a price they can afford?

Let’s start with flexibility in the cloud.  Simply put, this is what the cloud does best.  When the marketplace changes and we all know it does, the cloud allows business owners to turn the dial up or down as needed.  As an example, if a business jumps from 1,000 hits to 50,000 hits on their website and it’s positioned at a cloud hosting company like BlueLock, running on virtual machines, they can call the 24/7/365 operations staff and spin up more virtual servers – scalability on demand.  Conversely, if traffic slows in six months, simply turn the dial down and pay for the services being utilized – the beauty of metered usage…

Now that we have established that the cloud is flexible, the true objection of the cloud must be security.  Security is paramount when it comes to companies like BlueLock.  If in doubt, schedule a visit and see the layers of security BlueLock has to offer.  BlueLock’s privately owned building is made of poured concrete with a steel and concrete roof.  The actual servers are secured behind six levels of security and are accessed on a need-to-know basis. - TOUGH.

The use of Check Point firewalls and SAS 70 certification is the gold standard in the IT world and BlueLock utilizes both to protect its clients.  Ask yourself:  Where are my servers stored and who has access to them?  What if your servers crashed today?  What is your disaster recovery plan and how long could your servers be down before you start losing one customer?  What is the value of that customer?  These questions may be hard to answer, but the results could save your livelihood.  BlueLock has all of them answered for you, 24/7/365.

At this point, if I haven’t given you enough to think about with flexibility & security, you are probably in the mindset that it’s too costly!  Consider the amount you pay for your infrastructure.  Excessive CAPEX (capital expenditure) can bankrupt a company faster than a lack of customers.  What does it cost to build your own data center plus a back up site and then maintain it at the level that allows you to sleep at night?
 
Depending on the situation, the business may be a start-up or they may be upgrading existing servers. If you are a start-up, what do a full time IT employees cost?  If you build for today and you hit the home run you planned for, your company may be crippled.  If you spend too much CAPEX on IT infrastructure, you may not have enough left over for marketing and sales generating programs.  Once the original hardware purchase has been made, switching to outsourcing and OPEX (operating expenditure) is sometimes a difficult decision.   At some point, enough is enough when it comes to excessive CAPEX - you may need to go in a new direction and outsource – you may need to put your business in the cloud.

Having been a small business owner in the past, I can attest to each of these topics.  Flexibility is paramount in any business, security is critical when clients trust you with their personal data, and cost overruns will bankrupt even the well-informed business owner.  Having choices in the cloud is something that hasn’t been available in the past… Until now.

Fresh off center stage at VMware Partner Exchange 2010, BlueLock introduced its latest surprise, BlueLock CloudSuite.  After years of offering a robust enterprise-level service, businesses can now have the flexibility and price competitiveness of the newly introduced Bluelock vCloud Express.  For those who want managed services with varying levels of scale, security, and performance - choose between Virtual Cloud Professional and Virtual Cloud Enterprise.  A business that requires onsite control of their own isolated cloud can try the Virtual Private Cloud, you own it and BlueLock manages it.

If you have questions about BlueLock's enterprise cloud computing options, please contact us.

Security and compliance are hot topics in the cloud computing industry. PCI DSS is a set of requirements that, when adhered to, increase the level of security for payment cards transactions.

To become compliant with the PCI DSS, an organization must meet all of the security requirements and maybe even go through a formal auditing process, depending on the number of transactions processed each year. While these requirements may seem inconvenient,

But, can organizations really become PCI-compliant in a cloud computing hosting environment?

In searching for an answer to this question it's importnat to ask, "What kind of cloud computing service?" Many security experts have discussed the topic on panels and in the blogs, like this one. Most of my experience is with infrastrucutre as a service.

Just in working on small business virtualization projects with clients, here at BlueLock, I've had get educated on PCI DSS. The tricky thing for cloud computing hosting companies is that with standards like PCI, there are both application-side and infrastructure-side requirements for compliance.

So with IaaS, where does the responsiblity reside?

Ultimately, it's the responsibility of the company that is doing the payment card processing. The scope of PCI DSS goes beyond what infrastructure as a service companies provide. So, if a cloud computing service provider claims that they are "PCI compliant," it's important to remember that you must still assess your own organization outside of what the service provider manages.

At BlueLock, we use tools from our partners at Shavlik to run regular compliance scans of our clients' environments. If it's important for your organization to be in compliance with PCI DSS, then it's important for you to audit yourself regularly.

To find out more about PCI DSS, visit the PCI Security Standards Council website.

SaaS virtualization is creating an ocean entrepreneurial opportunities, where small, nimble businesses can create real value by making creating more efficient ways of doing things.

One thing that James Urquhart points out in his Wisdom of Clouds blog post is that there is still a lot of opporutnity in the SaaS virtualization realm. Businesses that currently use enterprise apps need experts who can transition them to more robust and reliable SaaS apps. There is certainly plenty of room for experts like these to create value, while collecting strategic consulting and referral fees.

As more and more companies take on SaaS apps to manage their business processes, the need for consolidation will increase. Imagine the ability to pay for your campany's blogging platform, accounting system, email marketing platform, and CRM tool -- all on one bill. Now wouldn't that be nice? Urquart rightly points out that SaaS meter consolidatoin could craete a level of convenience for which some companies would be willing to pay.

It will be interesting to see how enrepreneurial companies take advantage of the small pockets of opoprtunity in the SaaS industry next year. It's hard to say which ideas will win, be you can be certain that speed and agility in deploying new business models will be key ingredients to success in SaaS virtualization innovation.

 

Because we needed another "top" list, I'd love to go through David Linthicum's latest list, "Top 5 Cloud Computing Predictions for 2010."

Prediction #1: The rise of cloud computing standards

The whole theme of standards and interoperability was a big topic in 2009, but those discussions were very conceptual, and not really actionable.  Some organizations waited on the wayside before adopting a cloud computing solution because standards and interoperability would prevent them from experiencing vendor lock-in. On that note, some have said that BlueLock was a bad name choice because it has a connotation that we would "lock" our clients in.  I like to think that BlueLock would make someone think of security, but I guess not.  However, our cloud uses VMware virtualization technology, so you can take your VMware stuff and take it wherever you like (as long as it stays VMware) if you decide you aren't a big fan of us.  No vendor-lockin here.  Back to topic - I can already tell from listening in on some strategic meetings here that interoperability will take on a large role this year for us.  I can only guess that we aren't the only cloud computing provider with that on our mind.

Prediction #2: First Major Cloud Computing Outages

This one is only a matter of time.  Stuff happens in the cloud.  The cloud still involves real people and of course, real technology.  Although outages will happen, your provider should make sure that there is a sufficient backup plan in order that will help alleviate those pains.  And of course, the second a "big" provider has a "big" mishap, all aim will go to the cloud.  However, Linthicum reminds us, "Despite the outages, cloud computing providers will maintain an uptime record that far exceeds that of most on-premise systems, but you won't hear about that in the technology press."

Prediction #3: Microsoft will be relevant in the cloud

Most businesses run Microsoft, so to say that Microsoft will not become a larger cloud player would be silly.  Now that they've finally got going on the cloud front, we'll see just how much of an impact they'll make, but we're sure to see them make some sort of splash.  However, "Google will continue to dominate small to medium-sized businesses, using its free ad-driven model for delivery of Google Docs and Gmail, with a few larger enterprise deals thrown in."

Prediction #4: Rapid Consolidation of Existing Providers

As cloud computing continues to grow, many of the successful providers will want to expand even more, which will involve buying up the smaller guys.  Hence, there will be less small providers and more big - consolidation.

Prediction #5: Rise of Cloud Computing Startups

As if 2009 didn't see enough, there will be more in 2010 as the technology leaves the stage of early adoption and reaches the masses.  As consolidation occurs (see prediction #4), market value will increase and more VC-backed startups will sprout up.  Think you've seen a lot of "as a services" this year?  It won't be the end of it.

Read David's original post here.

Do you have a prediction for the cloud in 2010?

Fifty companies, including BlueLock (18 from Indianapolis) were named to the Indiana Companies to Watch list.  The list was compiled after the submission of over 500 nominations by the Indiana Economic Development Corp., its small business development network, Purdue University and the Edward Lowe Foundation. 

We'd like to congratulate two of our clients for also making the list: Vontoo and WebLink International.  Great job guys!

Rob England recently wrote an article on cloud computing entitled, “Cloud Computing Outlook Far From Sunny.”  He adamantly argues that cloud computing is a good fit for “high risk/low-capital applications like startups or small business or websites” but has a “more jaundiced view” towards the cloud for enterprise computing and existing core applications.

Yes, everyone has jumped on the cloud bandwagon and is touting “cloud” on every offering possible in hopes of grabbing a small piece of a very large pie that being eaten up as we speak, but that doesn’t mean it’s a worthless technology for the enterprise.  England says, “Quite simply, the idea is impractical for legacy enterprise applications.”  He claims that this “technical solution” doesn’t really solve the non-technical business problems, but actually presents more problems, introducing greater complexities to manage.  He doesn’t have software as a service in mind in this article, which is good because neither do I.  He is talking about the “internal grids or hosted computing or the myriad of other things that seem to get lumped into ‘The Cloud.’”  Great, because I’m assuming by that, he’s including what we call “infrastructure as a service.” 

The number one problem, he argues, is migrating legacy applications.  It is true that some applications simply weren’t built for the cloud, which is probably why he is so skeptical of legacy migration.  But many others would argue that it won't be impossible forever.  Bernard Golden, author of The Case Against Cloud Computing, believes that at some point someone will develop a physical-to-cloud migration tool that can alleviate those technical migration pains.  I’m with him.  It’s going to happen. 

But more importantly, I don’t believe that there is any reason why enterprise clients should stay away from cloud computing.  There are many enterprise-level cloud options out there.  And if the worry is that there will be too many pains associated with a large enterprise moving into the cloud, why don’t they opt for a full-service cloud, like those offered by managed service companies (such as BlueLock)?  Then they don’t have to worry about the resources, people and time it takes to migrate everything to the cloud, their service provider will do that for them. 

Mary Hayes Weier wrote a piece about the misconceptions of cloud computing in InformationWeek’s “Plug Into the Cloud.”

Conventional wisdom says that small and midmarket companies are more interested in cloud computing due to their tighter infrastructure budgets and constraints while larger companies want to keep everything inside their walls (i.e. private cloud computing performed in-house).

However, she argues, Forrester’s research shows that thinking is wrong.

Myth #1: Smaller companies are more interested in cloud computing.
Forrester’s research shows 1 in 4 large companies with 1,000 employees or more plan to employ an external provider or have already done so for pay-per-use computing of virtual servers, AKA infrastructure-as-a-service (lately also called computing as a service).  In comparison, only 18% of midmarket and 15% of small businesses have plans for IaaS, from a survey of more than 2,600 hardware decision makers at organizations.

Myth # 2: Larger Companies are more interested in internal or private clouds.
Forrester’s research shows that 33% of large companies plan to outsource their IaaS while only 24% want to run their own clouds. 44% plan to use a mixture of both.  (Hint: we believe a mixture of public/private will be the solution that will make the most sense for the most companies going forward, along with different types of public clouds for different needs – production, test/dev, etc.)

Another finding I find not too surprising: the larger the company, the greater the awareness of pay-per-use cloud computing.

Company size & percentage of those unaware of cloud computing:

20,000 +: 21% of respondents
5,000 – 19,000: 23%
500 – 5000: 20%
100 – 499: 26%
100 or less: 31%

In a recent article in InfoWorld, Zia Khan examines the hype on cloud computing.  He argues that while there may be more hype than reality for the enterprise sector, it’s not that way for smaller organizations (SMEs/SMBs).  Khan states:

“…but the SME and the organizations that are already strapped for cash, they really have no option other than the cloud.”

I think they have other options, but not if they want to stay competitive or even sometimes stay afloat in this economic climate.  Enterprises many times have the economies of scale to handle a DIY virtualization process…they’ve got the people and the bandwidth.  But startups, such as new software-as-a-service companies, don’t have the manpower to build their own infrastructure, manage it and have time to focus on their own core business processes, like updating their code and optimizing their products for the people who matter, their clients.  That’s when Infrastructure as a Service companies like BlueLock make perfect business sense.

The advantages of virtualization are endless, and for many small companies the route to virtualization is through a trusted hosting partner.  Rather than investing tons of capital in hardware, software and infrastructure people, SMBs can move their infrastructure to a virtual cloud, enabling them to focus on improving the features and functionality of their software to beat out the competition. For those companies who like the idea of having their own private cloud, we’ve got a solution for you too and we can link it up to spill over to our cloud if necessary to give you even more bandwidth to work with.

I’ll wrap this up with one more quote from Mr. Zia Khan:

“One thing is for certain – in times of an economic downturn, cloud computing is ideal – it will just take a while for companies to get there.”

Let’s just hope your competition doesn’t get there first.

In a controversial presentation last week titled “Clearing the Air on Cloud Computing,” an analyst from McKinsey delivered his findings on the costs and benefits of cloud computing. His preliminary finding, based on one client, is that cloud computing would actually be more expensive.   The response to this report has varied dramatically. 

Personally, I felt the study was too narrow, and failed to consider the implications of a gradual transition, or the benefits of improved access to data and process. In fact, I might suggest that McKinsey is playing catch up in the cloud and showed us that they’re a little behind on content and vision.  There is a tremendous amount of energy being spent by many companies, especially VMware on creating cloud “inter-operability”, which will allow large and small companies to be very thoughtful about where they place certain applications. 

Thus, as John Foley suggests in his post, it will not be an either or proposition – it will likely be both.  I met a company last week at VMware by the name of IT Structures and their main value proposition was the ability to turn up and turn off quickly demo sites and test sites.  They can do in days what it would take internal IT departments weeks to do.  Now why wouldn’t a large enterprise “bless” that sort of behavior? It makes them more flexible and it keeps the business happy and moving forward.  This, of course is just one idea for how “specialty” clouds will add value to enterprise companies.
Here is what a few others had to say:

Amy Wohl, In a post entitled McKinsey Got it Wrong She says:

The value of cloud computing lies elsewhere: 

• In the flexibility of being able to gain immediate access to additional computing (or to shrink your system when you don't need it).
• In the difference in Time to Market for new business opportunities.
• In the additional value (not included in the McKinsey study) provided in clouds that offer to manage the hardware (via systems software and other offerings) or to provide applications (SaaS). 

Writing for Information Week, John Foley is less critical of the report overall, but he does say:

McKinsey paints cloud computing too much an either/or decision, and that's the wrong way to look at it. IT pros need to do both--virtualize internal systems like crazy and investigate cloud services as a fast, flexible, and cost effective (if not always cheaper) option to capital investment in on-premises software and hardware.

As the responses continue, what do you think or the McKinsey report?

BlueLock was recently featured in the Indianapolis Business Journal. The Small Business Profile explains BlueLock's Infrastructure-as-a-Service model and the virtual cloud computing offerings that have made BlueLock the success that it is today.

The writer explains the benefits of BlueLock's cloud computing technology:

Read what else they had to say.

The devastating fire this past week to the apartment complex on the canal could have been significantly worse if the buildings were occupied.  And if they were would the homeowners, home business owners and small business that were to occupy the space have had appropriate backup and a disaster recovery plans?  Do You?

According to a recent survey conducted by Thomson Financial, 34 percent of companies do not maintain a backup work facility.   If your facility was temporarily or permanently shut down how would your employees access data and programs which keep your business running?

With virtual disaster recovery, all you need is a place to plug your laptop, and you will be back in business, no matter how devastating the crisis.  

Glen Curtis has written a fairly in-depth analysis of how a number of industries are addressing disaster recovery planning. 
 

Accidents happen! But even minor mishaps can be major catastrophes for small business owners. Every year, thousands of companies are unprepared for the interruption caused by a minor fire, flood, and burglary or computer meltdown.  How widespread is the problem?  According to a (NFIB) National Small Business Poll, man-made disasters affect 10% of small businesses, and natural disasters have impacted more than 30% of all small businesses in the USA.

And even more alarming are the findings from the Financial Planning Association: Of the businesses which suffer a disaster, 40% fail to reopen.  An additional 25% of those which reopen never recover from the losses and setbacks and close within a year.

So the question is are your prepared.  Do you have a comprehensive back up, of your data and processes?   How quickly will you be operational if disaster strikes?   In this brief video demonstration, using Logo building blocks, our CEO, John Qualls shows how a cloud based disaster recovery strategy creates an affordable and reliable disaster recovery solution.

 

In a recent post on in Wisdom of the Clouds,  James Urquat talks about small businesses and cloud computing.   Using survey data from Rackspace as a starting point, he explains the problem begins with awareness, as more than two-thirds of small businesses have never heard of "cloud hosting." 

What will happen as these companies begin to discover cloud computing?  This untapped market has huge potential.  Individually none of the projects would be very large, but collectively, there is tremendous opportunity for the right suppliers.  Urquat says:
 

What I'd love to see is various cloud providers (at all levels of the stack) creating programs that specifically advertise and market themselves to mom-and-pop services, manufacturing shops, and so on. Targets for volume should be impressive; 100,000 customers should not be a surprising goal.
 

And the financial benefits for these smaller companies are significant when compared to their overall operating budgets.  This is apparent when you look at the case of Marian College.  The InformationWeek writer compares their environment to real cloud as "something less of a cumulous."

But this small college, with a student body of 2,100, has dipped into cloud computing, virtualized its infrastructure, made virtual servers available over the network practically on demand, and coordinated its internal operations with an outside cloud located at BlueLock.  The program was begun to bring an affordable disaster recovery solution to the university -  improved processing times, and ability to share information have led to other benefits as well.   For more on Marian College, view this video:

 

In what is sure to be perceived as a somewhat controversial post. Mark Evert Hall presents the argument that SaaS hurts a fragile IT economy. Why - because you need fewer IT staff members to support your operations when you subscribe to existing service. In the short term, he is concerned that instead of reallocating resources, cost conscious managers will simply use Cloud Computing to reduce headcount.  He says: 

 
“Of course, SaaS vendors couch their labor-reduction sales talk by saying that you will be able to put those people and systems to work doing something more productive or urgent. But you know that it allows you to cut heads. And in today's economy, that's just what you'll do because the most urgent and productive thing an IT executive can do in 2009 is reduce headcount. “
 

Even with his concerns, I did not take this article as negative. The staff reductions will challenge companies to be more productive, and make better use of employees. It will also challenge individual team members to "raise their game."  The reality is during times of economic downturns, we see tremendous innovation as some of the best players are displaced and turn their talents toward new innovative ideas. For these innovators, inside large companies or small start-ups (without significant human or capital resources) access to SaaS and IaaS through cloud computing and virtual servers will accelerate innovation.  Hall sums it up when he says: 

“…it will be a god-send choice to launch new business initiatives and to quickly gain competitive advantage in an expanding market. “

 As I talk to people about BlueLock, I am often asked this question.  “Is my business really big enough to consider a Cloud Computing solution?”

My answer:  The deciding factor on whether or not you should move to a cloud computing environment is not really a question of size, but one of dependence on core technology to maintain the business.  For example what happens to your business if your servers are down for 20 minutes?  If the result of the outage is missed sales opportunities and dissatisfied customers, a cloud environment will make sense because of the resiliency, redundancy and disaster recovery protocols. 

If your small business is growing rapidly, and you can not accurately anticipate future demand on your infrastructure, a Cloud Computing environment eliminates the constraints as you access as much or as little of he capacity as you need.   


And finally, if you have limited IT staff, the switch to the Cloud allows you to hire talent to develop or sell your product instead of maintaining your infrastructure.  

 

Making the move to the Cloud is not a question of how big you are, but how big you want to be!