Author: Dr Will Venters

Lecturer in Information Systems, Department of Management, London School of Economics.

Latest article published: Strategic Outsourcing: An International Journal | Cloud Sourcing and Innovation: Slow Train Coming? A Composite Research Study

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The latest article from our long-running Cloud Computing research stream has just been published…

Leslie Willcocks, Will Venters, Edgar A. Whitley, (2013) “ Cloud Sourcing and Innovation: Slow Train Coming? A Composite Research Study“, Strategic Outsourcing: An International Journal, Vol. 6 Iss: 2

ABSTRACT:

Purpose – Although cloud computing has been heralded as driving the innovation agenda, there is growing evidence that cloud is actually a “slow train coming”. The purpose of this paper is to seek to understand the factors that drive and inhibit the adoption of cloud particularly in relation to its use for innovative practices.

Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws on a composite research base including two detailed surveys and interviews with 56 participants in the cloud supply chain undertaken between 2010 and 2013. The insights from this data are presented in relation to set of antecedents to innovation and a cloud sourcing model of collaborative innovation.

Findings – The paper finds that while some features of cloud computing will hasten the adoption of cloud and its use for innovative purposes by the enterprise, there are also clear challenges that need to be addressed before cloud can be successfully adopted. Interestingly, our analysis highlights that many of these challenges arise from the technological nature of cloud computing itself.

Research limitations/implications – The research highlights a series of factors that need to be better understood for the maximum benefit from cloud computing to be achieved. Further research is needed to assess the best responses to these challenges.

Practical implications – The research suggests that enterprises need to undertake a number of steps for the full benefits of cloud computing to be achieved. It suggests that collaborative innovation is not necessarily an immediate consequence of adopting cloud computing.

Originality/value – The paper draws on an extensive research base to provide empirically informed analysis of the complexities of adopting cloud computing for innovation.

SaaS cloud pricing: Can it ever add up? | ZDNet

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SaaS cloud pricing: Can it ever add up? | ZDNet.

The above links to an article Toby Wolpe at ZDNet has written on SaaS cloud pricing for which he interviewed me extensively.

Take a look!

 

I particularly like that he included the following quote:

It may not be in the short term, but SaaS providers will need to show a profit at some point. “That they haven’t got economic models doesn’t necessarily mean they can’t continue as long as their investors are prepared to shovel money into it,” Venters said.

Cloud computing can change organisations – whether they like it or not

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Even for organisations who avoid the adoption of cloud computing, its impact can be felt, and they too can face significant challenges from the adoption of cloud outside their perceived citadel. This is perhaps most obviously demonstrated with the case of Sukey.org.

In January 2011 the streets of London echoed to the sound of students campaigning against the imposition of tuition fees. Tens of thousands poured into the streets to make their voices heard, and the police, desperate to avoid the vandalism and violence of a protest in November the year before, attempted to use a “kettling” technique.

Kettling involves the police confining the demonstrators into a small area such as a square. Once trapped the police simply wait – keeping the demonstrators until they are tired and hungry and just want to go home. The police’s ability to kettle students thus involves their coordinating themselves to encircle the demonstrators – for which they rely on sophisticated (and expensive) communications infrastructure involving radios, control-centres and helicopters (within their organisational firewall).

But at this protest some of the students had installed a smartphone application called “Sukey” created by integrating (mashing-up) a number of cloud based services (Economist 2011) (See sidebar to understand the name).

Sukey.org used social media to allow those on the ground to report the movements of protesters and police through twitter and social networks. These reports were then catalogued on a Google-map – accessible by protesters using their smartphones. The application (build quickly by a small number of students) harnessed cloud computing and the mobile phone infrastructure to provide the protesters with a sophisticated information infrastructure similar to that of the police. This system was believed to limit the ability of the police to kettle the protesters – as they quickly moved through side-streets to avoid the police cordons.

This example shows how the police force was challenged, and their abilities constrained by a small group harnessing the “cloud” despite the police’s investment in information and communications technology. This shows that the availability of cloud computing deterministically altered what it is to police, despite the fact that the police had not changed their own infrastructure. It shows how organisations boundaries can become blurred as a consequence of outside action exploiting cloud.

Argh – “Cloud Computing as a Service (CaaS) Free Podcast”

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So today I received a sales pitch to download a Podcast for “The benefits of cloud computing as a service”…

There clearly comes a point in the “Gartner hype cycle” when things have clearly gone too far. For me this podcast was  hard evidence that this time has come for cloud.

So please please please don’t click on the following link – just think about the  “10 Goto 10” infinite loop it is trying to create…. And start to think that perhaps the term cloud computing has now finally had its day!

The Benefits of Cloud Computing as a Service (CaaS) Free Podcast.

****UPDATE ***

Okay – so Max Cooter (Of Cloud Pro) pointed out the link between this podcast and a telecos company (thanks for this Max). I then thought further about what they were trying to get to with the idea of “Cloud Computing as a Service” – presumably the selling of the offering of cloud computing services to other teleco’s (or similar) so they can become IaaS / PaaS providers using their brands without having to do any of the work. I guess this is a good service to offer – but it doesn’t exactly fit the CCaaS name. Perhaps “Service Provider as as Service (SPaaS)  or Virtual Cloud Provider (VCP) would work better!

So finally my apologise to the author of the podcast… and next time I will try to engage my brain a little more before I criticise too!

Morgan Stanley argued Amazon Web Services (AWS) is a threat to all IT (from Cloud Pro)

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Morgan Stanley says retail approach has turned cloud service provider into mega-vendor

 

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is a threat to almost all areas of IT and should be able to reach $24 billion (£15.78 billion) in revenue by 2022, according to a new report by seven Morgan Stanley analysts, led by Scott Devitt. The report points to AWS’ application of “retail economics” to the IT sector as the reason the company is emerging as an “IT mega-vendor”. This is a threat to many existing incombants. Read the full article here:  Morgan Stanley: AWS a threat to all IT | Cloud Pro.

The Great Deverticalisation – part 3: New skills and structures in the public sector

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An interesting article by an old friend of mine at Cambridge University – Mark Thompson (with Jerry Fishenden) discussing the value of open standards in challenging the lethargy caused by incumbent IT suppliers with their “bespoke” solutions.

The Great Deverticalisation – part 3: New skills and structures in the public sector.

I’m speaking on “managing the Cloud Corporation” at the Enterprise Cloud Computing and Virtualization conference 2013 – London March 26th Britannia International.

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The Essential Cloud Computing….

The coming of the cloud corporation: Cloud is about the organisation changing rather than IT changing

To see cloud computing as the mere outsourcing of computing to the “cloud” is to miss the collaborative and innovative potential of this shift. Dr Venters explores the need to learn the lessons from the PC era of the 1980s to effectively understand how Cloud Computing might change enterprises. He posits that we need to think about how we can manage a different type of IT led organisation – something he terms the cloud corporation. This has important lessons for public and private enterprise – as new forms of system emerge which challenge their ways of working (e.g. SmartCities and the Urban-Operating-System).

Microsoft secure Azure Storage goes down WORLDWIDE • The Register

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Apparently a huge failure of the Azure storage platform is happening at the moment…  Microsoft secure Azure Storage goes down WORLDWIDE • The Register.

Oh dear – this doesn’t bode particularly if the register is correct that it’s “probably because Redmond let the HTTPS certificate expire…apparent schoolboy error”

Say goodbye to the IT department

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Dell have produced a dongle which plugs into monitors HDMI port and connects to Bluetooth peripherals (keyboard/mouse..) and WiFi  While it is a basic Android machine, its value is in automatically providing a virtualized PC environment from Dell’s Wyse data-centre.

Imagine dispensing with all the PCs in an office and simply having monitors with a dongle attached and leaving the PC maintenance to Dell in the cloud.

Dell Wyse Project Ophelia thin client unveiled at CES 2013 | Cloud Pro

Obviously some will argue this is a greener option (yes if the Dell Cloud is multiplexing to provide the virtualized environments and using efficient machines); an easier option (not necessarily- since you are adding another layer of hardware in the mix – though you are outsourcing PC desktop maintenance to Dell); a cheaper option (who knows – that will very much depend on the service charges going forward – PCs aren’t exactly expensive these days in hardware terms – only in software and maintenance terms).

Dell Wyse Project Ophelia thin client unveiled at CES 2013 | Cloud Pro.