‘Cloudbusting’

What is it?

This service offering is a consultancy exercise which helps organisations evaluate the pros and cons of Cloud computing, and the implications of how they run their operations. Potential discussion points and deliverables include:

Options report, e.g. an evaluation of which cloud services might be appropriate, which providers should be considered in the customer’s situation.
It may well also include a look at Cloud’s effect on business strategy, it’s fit with existing IT infrastructure, typical usage scenarios, and security issues.

Why do it?

Typically, most organisations are constrained in terms of how effectively / quickly they can execute business strategy, because of the need to re-work their IT systems.

Cloud computing is an emerging area of IT provision which allows customers to buy the computing capacity they need over the Internet, from facilities hosted by service providers.

This complements, and in some cases, replaces the existing model where you buy the hardware and software and implement it yourself.

The main discussion around Cloud is in the technical sphere. However, the business implications are only just being guessed at – as Nick Carr expounds in his book about Cloud computing – ‘The Big Switch’[1].

What are the benefits?

Cloud computing can turn capital expenditure into operational expenditure, i.e. you only need to pay for the computing power you use, and like other utilities, pay for it once you have used it.

This means you have less cash tied up in your technology infrastructure, enabling you to spend it on other priorities.

Cloud computing offers greater flexibility than traditional IT, in that you can buy extra capacity as needed, and stop paying for it when you don’t.

You expenditure will therefore match your usage, and you won’t be left with kit sitting in the corner unused.

It can provide a disaster recovery option, and also has the potential to provide computing resources so your existing datacentre doesn’t get filled up, or else can be an interim solution whilst you migrate an application from one piece of hardware to another, potentially eliminating loss of service to users.