The Distributed Computing Industry Association (DCIA) is organizing the first P2P & Cloud Market Conference in New York on March 9. Speakers will discuss market strategies, business models and issues surrounding the use of intellectual property over P2P networks and clouds.
The agenda is not yet complete but it appears to be aiming at [Read More →]
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Conference on cloud marketing and P2P planned for March
February 8, 2010 — GusMicrosoft gives NSF projects a free pass
February 5, 2010 — GusHoping to gain a toehold in the government’s move toward cloud computing, Microsoft has presented the National Science Foundation (NSF) with an offer that is difficult to refuse: any project approved by the NSF can run on Windows Azure at no charge.
The NSF has already gained access to cloud-based software services from Google and [Read More →]
IBM wins Air Force contract in major test of cloud security
February 4, 2010 — GusThe momeuntum coming out of the U.S. government for cloud projects continues to build. IBM announced it won a contract from the U.S. Air Force for a the design and demonstration of a secure cloud computing infrastructure capable of supporting defense and intelligence networks.
One of the challenges — and opportunities — for IBM is [Read More →]
NASA commissions a platform for shared computational modeling
February 4, 2010 — GusYou might call this a cloud platform for modeling clouds. NASA is awarding a $600,000 contract to develop a platform that will allow engineers and scientists to execute computational modeling from a browser. The contractor is Parabon Computation Inc., a ten-year old DC-area company that focuses on computational analysis for distributed systems, especially grids.
The new [Read More →]
Startup Makara offers cloud portability solution
February 3, 2010 — GusOne of the main objections to deploying applications in a cloud platform is the fear of being locked-in, after customizing legacy apps to work within a specific platform (PaaS). A startup backed by several high-profile VCs is coming to market with a solution.
Makara’s Cloud Application Platform works like a cloud management layer for applications, sitting [Read More →]
Azure emerges from beta, is a price war next?
February 3, 2010 — GusMicrosoft kept to its schedule and has promoted Windows Azure from its very long beta status to full-fledged paid product. And the first market reaction came almost immediately, as Amazon dropped prices.
The timing could not have been more obvious. The same day that Amazon agreed to change pricing policies on Kindle eBooks in reaction [Read More →]
Federal budget funds a transition to cloud platforms
February 2, 2010 — GusThe 2011 budget allocates $79 billion for IT spending and one of the priorities is going to be implementation of cloud computing platforms. 2010 will be a year of pilot projects with cloud architectures becoming part of the long range plan for greater efficiency. The reasons are buried deep within the OMB (Office of Management [Read More →]
CA warchest of $300 million will go toward cloud acquisitions
February 1, 2010 — GusWilliam McCracken wasted very little time. Within hours of being named to the position of CEO at CA, he set his sites on a major cloud computing acquisition, and said he had up to $300 million to spend. Just a few weeks ago, CA acquired Oblicore which provides a platform for service level management (SLM). [Read More →]
Oracle puts down the Sun Cloud
January 28, 2010 — GusAs the acquisition of Sn Microsystems finally closed, one of the first official acts taken by Oracle is to terminate the program known as Sun Cloud. It would have been a platform for building cloud architectures using an API based on Sun’s standards, including Java, MySQL, and OpenSolaris. Larry Ellison has gained a reputation [Read More →]
Worth fearing: the next big wave in IT
January 28, 2010 — GusThe Wall Street Journal posed a time-honored question to EMC’s chief executive Joe Tucci yesterday. “What keeps you up at night?” EMC holds controlling shares in a number of major technology companies, including VMware and RSA Security, and it has just reported 2009 income was up 58 percent.
“What keeps you up all night is these [Read More →]
Equity research coverage initiated on 4 companies; 2 buy ratings, 2 neutral
January 27, 2010 — GusRackspace (NYSE: RAX) and Terremark (Nasdaq: TMRK) were rewarded with Buy Ratings in a new report that was issued on cloud computing equities. Merriman Curhan Ford is a financial services firm that provides equity research on sectors that it believes represent the potential for high growth. Until its new cloud computing coverage was initiated, [Read More →]
UK planning a broad cost-saving move to cloud platforms
January 27, 2010 — GusA plan is being circulated within the U.K. to move its government IT services onto a cloud platform based on open source software. The selling point is the potential for £3.2 billion a year savings (US $5.2 billion). To achieve the savings, the government would need to build ten to twelve data centers, each costing [Read More →]
Private clouds delivered in 30 days, limited offer
January 26, 2010 — GusPlanning, building and deploying a virtual data center is generally not a project with a one-month timeline. But Surgient, an Austin, Texas manager of data centers, is trying to make a splash with a simple offer. They will go through the whole process of planning, customizing and building a secure, private cloud infrastructure for corporations [Read More →]
VMware’s Maritz, in posting solid growth, affirms clouds are the next wave of IT
January 26, 2010 — GusA year ago, its customers were uncertain about what they would be doing. But recovery set in as the year came to a close. And now, Paul Maritz, CEO of VMware closed out 2009’s financial results by telling investors that in the last quarter, he was able to get a clear vision for what his [Read More →]
Microsoft is asking Congress to legislate on cloud computing
January 22, 2010 — GusApparently Brad Smith’s mother never told him, “Be careful what you wish for.” Mr. Smith went to Washington yesterday and spoke out in favor of federal laws to support cloud computing.
Smith is a senior vice-president and general counsel at Microsoft, and he was speaking at the Brookings Institution, one of the top think tanks in [Read More →]
Intuit prefers Azure for its partner platform
January 21, 2010 — GusMicrosoft has won over Intuit with its new Azure platform. Developers who sell customized versions of QuickBooks will be encouraged to use Azure cloud hosting as the preferred home for their applications.
Intuit rolled out the Workplace App Center last year; it helps build the TurboTax and QuickBooks franchises by showcasing extensions created by independent [Read More →]
Chinese hack into Google mail may be a flaw in Microsoft browser, not cloud defences
January 21, 2010 — GusWhen Google warned that it might not be able to provide secure email within China, a number of people considered it an indictment of the cloud computing model. However, it now appears that the security hole is in Microsoft’s IE browser, not Google’s security layer.
The WindowsSecrets tip site has the story on this Internet Explorer [Read More →]
Hosting companies working together for Haiti hurricane relief effort
January 20, 2010 — GusThe enormous need is clear. And it will be there for a long time to come. So a group of companies that are normally highly competitive are coming together in an effort to help the Red Cross’s fund-raising efforts.
Rackspace, GoGrid, Peer1, ServInt and ThePlanet have put together a website at Hosting for Haiti that links [Read More →]
Sybase testing cloud deployment internally
January 20, 2010 — GusJim Swartz, the CIO of enterprise software company Sybase, explained his philosophy toward cloud computing in an interview with CIO Update. Swartz said “we’re absolutely going to be looking at this more closely in terms of what it’s going to mean, long-haul, because as an organization, to help the company keep its margins in perspective. [Read More →]
IBM extends LotusLive with cloud platform services and APIs
January 19, 2010 — GusLotus has re-invented itself several times since IBM bought it in 1995. Lotus Notes was a pioneering collaboration tool back then; it was providing a robust client-server environment at a time when many people had not even experienced Internet email or web browsing.
Now, Lotus is morphing into Lotus Live, a hosted cloud computing platform for [Read More →]
