Despite the hype, media attention and adoption patterns to date, the cloud is still a relatively new technology with many questions still to be answered. Nevertheless, the concept of moving sensitive business information and applications into an off-premises environment managed by a third party is profoundly changing how businesses think about, purchase, and manage technology. That change has led technology leaders to invest in new strategies, both in their internal operational environments, as well how they approach their customers, with many of the leading technology vendors leading the charge.
ITEXPO (News - Alert) Miami 2013 recently hosted a “Battle for the Cloud” superpanel, including some of the biggest names in technology today, discussing the future of cloud computing and how it will impact the future of businesses. HP’s representative on the panel, Director of Product Marketing Kiran Bellare, spoke with Cloud Computing to discuss how the growth of cloud computing and other tech trends are changing the way businesses operate. Read the full exchange below:
EL: What is the most significant technology trend impacting the way businesses conduct operations today?
KB: Businesses increasingly need to accelerate the time to test, deploy and scale online applications. Globally distributed teams are also driving a need for increased collaboration and new, innovative applications. The ability to access these applications from mobile and tablet devices is now essential. All of these trends are driving increased usage of the public cloud.
EL: How is cloud computing changing the way you operate your business?
KB: Moving production workloads to the public cloud and supporting the rapid deployment of new applications on an open source foundation has required us to build a new, much more agile and responsive organization.
EL: Have security concerns around cloud computing been effectively addressed by the market, or is security still impediment to adoption?
KB: I don’t think the cloud is necessarily any less secure than traditional hosting, although there are unique areas that need to be addressed. Well-known security compliance standards and monitoring tools apply to the cloud, but due diligence should include a cloud provider’s proactive and reactive security plan. Security in the cloud should remain a priority, but does not need to be an impediment to adoption.
EL: How has the unprecedented growth of social media changed the way you manage your customers?
KB: Social media has required us to have a more matrix-oriented approach to interacting with customers anytime, anywhere. More individuals across every job function are now more directly engaged with customers and potential customers to answer questions and incorporate feedback.
EL: “Customer Experience” has become buzzword and 2013 may well become characterized as the Year of Customer Experience. What is your business doing to improve your customers’ experiences?
KB: We are striving to provide our customers flexibility in development tools, an environment that fuels innovation and the expertise to help them accomplish their goals for the public cloud, regardless of complexity.
EL: Keeping in mind that BYOD is now pervasive and no longer a phenomenon, will BYOD heavily influence your business in 2013 (whether from a security, policy or device or app management perspective) or have we moved beyond BYOD?
KB: I believe the industry has moved beyond BYOD as a policy decision given that it is now a de facto requirement for organizations rather than an option, but it will remain an ongoing concern with respect to security and app management.
EL: BYOS – Bring Your Own Storage (or rather, Bring Your Own Cloud-based Storage) – and dealing with it may, in fact, now be the new major issue most enterprises and solutions providers need to deal with. Is your company prepared to deal with it, either at the carrier level or through independent vendors?
KB: Yes, HP has network and security management systems that can address BYOS as well as enterprise oriented partner solutions that can serve as alternatives to consumer cloud storage.
EL: Should enterprises look to pre-empt BYOS issues by moving to carefully controlled cloud storage in 2013?
KB: This would certainly help, but like BYOD, organizations will still have to implement security measures, policies and solutions to address BYOS.
EL: Unified Communications (News - Alert) and VoIP have moved beyond the early adopter phase into the mainstream. What significant issues still remain that businesses must contend with as they determine when and how to migrate to IP-based communications?
KB: Like any business critical application, security, uptime and quality of service will be key factors.
EL: Will 2013 be the year the laptop dies? Why or why not?
KB: Of course not. A well-designed laptop will continue to offer the best balance of performance, productivity and mobility for the widest range of applications. More people will own a laptop, tablet and smartphone device and choose which one to use based on where and how they wish to access their work and entertainment.
Edited by Stefania Viscusi
