“Cloud Computing” the BUZZ is in the Air - Part 1

We have been hearing a lot about a revolution which will change the way we do business. A revolution which will make the best IT solutions available to any organization/individual at a very reasonable cost, yes we have been hearing a lot about these two  revolutionary words ‘Cloud Computing’.  These series of my posts will focus on different aspects of Cloud Computing.

Cloud computing draws a very close analogy from the world of electricity. In 1851 Henry Burden invented the big Burden’s wheel to generate electricity for his factory. This revolutionized the way factories operated and in the years to follow many factories started their own electricity generating units. It was not long before Thomas Edison’s assistant Samuel Insull realized the potential of building central electricity generation units and providing factories and households with electricity at a cheaper cost. People saw the benefit of this approach and soon electricity generation shifted from individual companies to electricity generating organizations at a very fast pace allowing businesses to concentrate on their core competencies. All one needed were few wires from the electricity generation plant to their factory and pay for the number of unit of electricity they utilised. The electricity generating organizations were able to significantly reduce electricity cost because of economies of scale and were able to create significant business value out of this approach. This made electricity a utility and a necessity for all businesses and no longer gave companies any competitive advantage.

A similar revolution is currently underway in the technology industry where computing power is being talked of in the same breath as a utility service. The concept is called cloud computing, the general understanding held by the market is best described by this definition from Wikipedia “Cloud computing . . . is a style of computing where IT-related capabilities are provided ‘as a service,’ allowing users to access technology-enabled services ‘in the cloud’ without knowledge of, expertise with or control over the technology infrastructure that supports them". The idea being a user would now just need a terminal, internet connection (the cloud is the internet) and probably his credit card details to plug into the cloud. And a whole lot of applications and infrastructure would be available to him to use and pay for according to his usage.

In the early years of the last century the nature and economics of mechanical power changed with the centralization of electricity generation and we arrived at a moment where technology extended mans physical powers. We are at another such moment today with technologies that extend our intellectual powers.

Sundeep Malik
Information Technology Management
December’08