Cloud Computing

EMC announced Monday it has agreed to acquire Isilon Systems, a "big-data" company, for $2.25 billion in cash. EMC Chairman and CEO Joe Tucci noted that EMC decided to buy Isilon to take advantage of the waves of cloud computing and big data that are expected over the coming decade. Isilon is a majo...

As I reported in this space earlier this year, a growing number of IT professionals are putting aside their apprehensions about Software as a Service and cloud computing, and investigating how they can utilize these "on-demand" solutions to address their day-to-day IT management requirements. Now, a...

Information Technology managers often find themselves between a rock and hard place when it comes to IT budgets. Spend too much and they come under scrutiny; spend too little and they find themselves at the center of frustration and dissatisfaction. Unfortunately, Information Technology is a beast...

Last week's announcements centering on Intel's "Cloud 2015" vision represent one of the more intriguing cloud computing efforts to date. How so? First, out of the gate Cloud 2015 is resolutely client-facing. The related Open Data Center Alliance boasts over 70 large enterprise members such as BMW, D...

IBM is continuing its steady march to build out its cloud computing bona fides, this time with the rollout of new security offerings and an expansion of its cloud-based development tools with an emphasis on Windows. The larger point, said Harold Moss, IBM's emerging technology and cloud computing Ar...

Microsoft announced Tuesday that it will combine its Office productivity Web apps suite and integrated Shareport, Exchange and Lync services into a monthly package service beginning next year. The service, called "Office 365," is a significant step-up from the Web-based productivity apps Microsoft p...

Ray Ozzie is out as chief software architect at Microsoft, opening a big void through which analysts are tossing innumerable opinions regarding what the departure means for the company. Ozzie's role was frequently seen as being Bill Gates' successor as the company's visionary technologist, a foil to...

The IT industry purely loves "innovation," especially when it is steeped in a bit of controversy, and last November's announcement of Cisco, EMC and VMware's VCE coalition set enough tongues wagging to cause a minor blip in Silicon Valley's Richter scale readings. Why so? First, because the effort o...

As companies turn to cloud computing for its benefits -- including economies of scale and increased productivity -- concerns often arise around security. The idea of storing critical business data on a third-party server to which multiple tenants have access could be fraught with danger if not prope...

The allure of utilizing the latest advance in information technology -- cloud computing -- is that cloud applications will greatly increase efficiency and reduce IT costs. The U.S. government, which spends upwards of $80 billion per year on information technology, clearly presents a big opportunity...

With the explosive amounts of electronic information being generated daily, it's no wonder many companies are considering alternative storage options. None of these options has generated more interest than cloud-based systems. Companies are looking to cloud computing to ease the burden of informati...

One of the commonly accepted myths of the SaaS market and the broader cloud computing environment is that it is inherently a high-transaction business. This view has been fostered by the rapid growth of many commodity-oriented SaaS solutions and public cloud services. However, just as the overall te...

The U.S. government is searching for ways to reduce the fog of bureaucracy to improve communication with citizens, and has turned to the cloud as a key strategy to achieve that goal. In addition to improving services to taxpayers, use of the cloud could save cash-strapped federal agencies millions o...

Recent events have added further credence (if more was needed) to the growing body of evidence that -- despite the boundless hype -- cloud computing is a game-changing phenomenon that is having an impact on how people think about enterprise storage. VMWorld 2010 brought an estimated 17,000 people t...

Government information technology procurement has been largely conducted on an independent basis, with each federal agency determining its own needs and acquiring the infrastructure -- both hardware and software -- to meet those needs. However, the procurement landscape may change significantly with...