The Future of IT Sept 11

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Being flexibleUnderstanding theopportunities

Cost benefitsSaving money andbeing more efficient

Data managementControlling yourbusiness needs

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The migration begins: More and more businesses are lookingto the uture and finding out how they can adapt

PHOTO: SCOTTCHAN/SHUTTERSTOCK.COM

MAKING IT IN

THE CLOUD

Turn to page 3

THE FUTUREOF I.T.

10STEPS TO

CHOOSING THERIGHT PATH



2 · SEPTEMBER 2011 AN INDEPENDENT INSERT BY MEDIAPLANET

See I.T. break freethrough the cloud

2012 headlines: The London Olympics, the Queen’s DiamondJubilee and IT finally breaking out o the local server room

Inormation Technology has

been the powerhouse o

change and innovation or over

60 years, be it in solving com-

plex problems, automation o tasks, creation o new business

models, improvement in mass

communication or the enhance-

ment o collaboration across busi-

ness and social groups. We have

seen major technological shits

over this time also rom main-

rames, through PC’s and client-

server to the internet.

Undoubtedly in 2011, the uber

technology trends are those em-

bracing cloud computing and

mobile devices. The convergence

o agile, scalable, pay-as-you-use

computing capability, with an in-creasing penetration o portable

multimedia devices across the

wider population are driving a

sea change. Not just in the way IT

is conceived, but the way it is pro-

vided and consumed. The notion

o separate devices or work and

personal use is also ending. This is

being driven by flexible working

environments and dynamic con-

sumer experiences, that in turn

are advancing the philosophy o

consumerisation (leveraging the

behaviour and preerences o peo-

ple) within IT strategy.So in this brave new world, flexi-

bility and innovation are essential

ingredients to sustained commer-

cial success; running technology

on-premise is no longer critical,

but harnessing it and integrat-

ing it is. The rise o social media

can see ideas, brands, and reputa-

tions sink or swim in public opin-

ion, with news travelling at the

speed o light to an increasingly

interactive audience. Against this

backdrop, the scope o an organi-

sations’ IT capability is no longer

bounded by the corporate firewallor powered rom the server room,

but it exists within a wider plane

o interaction with markets, net-

works and devices.

Healthy growthCloud service adoption in the UK

is growing healthily. In research

conducted earlier this year by the

Cloud Industry Forum across 450

end user organisations, 48% had

already adopted at least one cloudservice. With a satisaction lev-

el or the services provided at over

90%, the vast majority intend to ex-

pand their adoption o cloud servic-

es quickly. With the barriers to us-

ing these new solutions being low

(no capital investment, no mini-

mum contract term), more and

more firms are conducting pilots.

That said, organisations have

practical questions they want an-

swered relating to data security

and sovereignty; they want to be

assured o service levels and the

ability to exercise control over theirIT. Those looking to extend their IT

rom an on-premise model to in-

clude a hosted or cloud services ca-

pability have many options open to

them, and it is not always easy to

be able to compare and contrast so-

lutions. To that end, the consistent

advice is to seek out best practice

such as is set out in the Cloud In-

dustry Forum Code o Practice and

to compare and contrast vendors

against that benchmark to provide

the trust that is essential to any

good partnership.

Standards and practicesThe challenge with any new tech-

nology, solution or market is how

to choose a vendor and how to be

assured o trust. Whilst interna-

tional standards will undoubt-

edly arise over time, we are still

some way away rom seeing this

in practice. The arena o cloudcomputing tends to have three

areas o ocus or driving stand-

ards. These could be simply com-

municated as the technical are-

as o security and interoperabil-

ity (i.e. is my data sae and can

I integrate it with other cloud

or on-premise solutions and/or

move it easily at the end o a con-

tract), and the commercial issue

o building trust between end us-

ers and their service providers.

The Cloud Industry Forum

(CIF), a not-or-profit organisa-

tion ounded in 2009, recognisethe challenge acing both credible

service providers looking to stand

out in a crowd and or end us-

ers looking to make an inormed

choice with so much ‘noise’ in

the market. Against a backdrop o

many market new entrants, and

the lack o any ormal standards,

CIF developed an independent

Code o Practice or Cloud Serv-

ice Providers. It requires them

to review their business practic-

es and operational capabilities

and to present inormation to the

market in a standard orm that inturn, enables end users to make a

rational and inormed decision.

Service providers are required

to certiy their organisations in

three areas which are reerred to

as transparency (inormation re-

garding the structure, legal names,

portolio, location and executives);

capability (the procedures, practic-

es and resources operated), and,

accountability (the binding com-

mitment o the executive/s o the

cloud service provider to the code

o practice). Once certified, serv-

ice providers can use the CIF certi-fied logo to validate their achieve-

ment on their websites, helping

end users recognise their commit-

ment to the code o practice.

Andy BurtonChairman, Cloud Industry Forum

‘We figured we couldspend £30,000 or£35,000 reproducingwhat we currentlyhad, or we couldmake a move to thecloud’

Mark BothamChief operatingofficer at BisHendersondiscusses hisexperience inmoving to thecloud

PAGE 8

THE FUTURE OF I.T.1ST EDITIONSEPTEMBER 2011

Country Manager: Willem De GeerEditorial Manager: Faye Godfrey

Business Development Manager:Hannah Butler

Responsible for this issueProject Manager: Gordon McCrackenPhone: 020 7665 4409E-mail:[email protected]

Distributed with: The GuardianSeptember 2011

Print: The Guardian print centre

Mediaplanet contact information:Phone: 020 7665 4400Fax: 020 7665 4419E-mail: [email protected]

With thanks to:

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WE RECOMMEND

CHALLENGES

Page 4: Making the moveIan Osbourne of Intellect UKdiscusses why many businesses aremoving to the cloud

Page 6: The Social NetworkDavid Terrar of D2C showshow social media is allowingorganisations to expand and develop

Page 12: Changing how you work Are we coming into a new era ofcollaboration? Dr Yinshan Tang ofHenley Business School talks



4 · SEPTEMBER AN INDEPENDENT INSERT BY MEDIAPLANET

The vast majority o organisations

were never set up to be experts run-

ning their own data centre and IT

inrastructure, it is just a role they

have had to evolve to perorm.

Now they have a choice. Compa-

nies o all sizes and government

organisations are actively inves-

tigating how to ree themselves

o the large cost and drain on re-

sources o constant investment in

large server rooms, not to mention

maintaining sotware packages

and their licences.Ian Osborne, Project Director

at Intellect UK certainly believes

that organisations who were a lit-

tle sceptical about cloud computing

just a year or so ago are now actively

investigating opportunities to take

advantage o it.

“The cloud’s now being rightly

seen as a very attractive opportunity

to let someone else worry about

the inrastructure that your sot-

ware and systems work on as well

as keep applications and licences

up to date,” he says.

“People have seen how well cloud

companies like Amazon and Goog-

le perorm. Even when there’s been

a rare outage, disruption has been

minimal and so services are still

better than they could provide or

themselves. Plus there’s so much

scale o inrastructure available in

the cloud that it makes the servicesincredibly cost-efective.”

Many companies are likely to use

some cloud services,such as the host-

ing o their website, or perhaps email

accounts or hosted applications. Os-

borne’s advice is to build on these by

adding new services one at a time.

Flexibility is keyThis is certainly the route that Ste-

ven Holord, Director at Fasthosts,

sees many organisations taking.

First moves generally tend to be

website and email hosting which

are oten ollowed by moving back-

up and storage services to thecloud, as well as running up test ca-

pabilities, portal applications and

the like. The cloud, he is also find-

ing, is proving an attractive space

or companies to develop new sot-

ware and services.

“The basic premise o why com-

panies choose to have their web site

and email hosted or them holds

true across their wider IT require-

ments,” he says. “A cloud provider

can do a better job than them, or

less. When you look at the resilience

a provider’s data centre will have

there’s just no comparison with a

business’ own premises. Plus they

get operational security o always

having their servers up to date and

secure with the latest patches with-

out them having to maintain any-

thing themselves.

“We find that a lot o people come

or the ease o use and flexibility, but ultimately it is the fiancial sav-

ings that makes them put addition-

al services in the cloud. The way

you can just add more capacity and

add more memory at the click o a

mouse is revolutionary.”

SEAN HARGRAVE

[email protected]

Question:Are organisations moving to the cloud and i so, why? Answer: Yes, many are starting with applications that are not

mission critical to dip their toe in the water. Flexibility is theprimary driver, but cost benefits soon take over

SEEING A GRADUAL

MIGRATION TO THE CLOUD

Ian OsbourneProject directorIntellect UK

NEWS

MAKING THE

MOVE

1STEP

World Class Web Hosting

Call us today to move yourbusiness to the Cloud

0844 583 0777or visit www. fasthosts.co.uk/cloud© 2011 All rights reserved. Fasthosts and the Fasthosts logo are trademarks of Fasthosts Internet Ltd.

Let’s

benefits



SEPTEMBER 2011 · 5 AN INDEPENDENT INSERT BY MEDIAPLANET

LOOKING TO THE FUTUREWe are seeing more and morebusinesses moving to the cloudand assessing the opportunities

available to themPHOTO: SCOTTCHAN/SHUTTERSTOCK.COM

MAXWELL COOTER’S TIPS2Making a start

For most organisations

hosting their website and

email could well mean they are

already in the cloud, or at least

have seen the advantage o al-

lowing a more robust third party

host two vital services. This is a

good starting point in providing

opportunity and building trust,

which are the two key aspects o

validating the business case or

hosted or cloud services.

Non mission criticalsolutions andnew services

Many cloud service provid-

ers would suggest that or

companies to get a sense o confi-

dence in the cloud, it is a good idea

to launch services which are not

critical to the business. Many

start of with back oce inra-

structure services such as stor-

age, hosed servers, back-up capa-

bility and testing services. Equal-

ly, companies seeking to deploynew solutions, or which they

have no capability in-house, are

oten great places to prove the val-

ue o cloud as it de-risks the or-

ganisations implementation and

avoids any capital costs or up-

ront long term commitment.

MAXWELL COOTER, EDITOR OF CLOUD PRO




SHOWCASE

Brands reach out

with social media

THE SOCIAL NETWORKTwitter, Facebook and Linkedinare among the social media

businesses are using todayPHOTO: 1000 WORDS/SHUTTERSTOCK.COM

In just a handul o years businesses

have moved rom an era where theypublished inormation at custom-

ers, consumers and prospects to one

where they spend at least as much

time listening to conversations and

contributing to them.

While the main platorms all have ob-

vious benefits, many organisations

are finding that they want to supple-

ment a presence on a third party site

by building their own service.This is

normally to exert more control over

the service,reveals David Terrar,Cloud

Industry Forum board member and

director o web developer D2C.

“A lot o companies and organisa-tions have a presence on the big so-

cial media services but they want

something o their own as well,

where they can take more control,”

he says.

“They oten want to make part, or

even all, o the service private so it

can be restricted to clients and staf

working within diferent categories

and disciplines. It means they can

set up diferent people to have vari-ous security rights. Someone might

be the supervisor or one part o the

service yet unable to access a conver-

sation in another part o the service.”

Plug-in option As a service that sits alongside

the web site an organisation al-

ready has, the cloud is providing

the perect pl atorm, Terrar adds.

“The beauty o the cloud is that

people can try out new servic-

es and experiment without the

huge expense o commissioning

the servers and the applications

and so on,” he says.

“They know that in the cloud

they can buy a service and i it

doesn’t work or them they can

just switch it o and they’venot got redundant equipment to

worry about and they’ve lost on-

ly a minimal sum. O course, the

cloud means companies ca n get a

social media service up and run-

ning not just or less investment

but also at ar greater speed. A lot

o organisations have their own

IT teams, but they preer to have

someone provide them with a so-

cial media platorm because it’s

so much simpler.”

These new services come with

the added bonus that sponsor-

ship deals can oten pay or anydevelopment costs.

SEAN HARGRAVE

[email protected]

There are more than 750m active

users on Facebook of which half will

normally log in on any given day. More

than 700bn minutes are spent by peo-

ple on Facebook every month.

Twitter has 200m users who

create 200m tweets every day and

LinkedIn has more than 120m mem-bers who performed more than 2bn

searches for people last year.

FACTS

David Terrar

Director of D2Cand CIF member

NEWS

STAY UP TODATE

2STEP

Question: Social media is anew way for businesses to talkto their staff and customers,how is the cloud helping out?

Answer: The cloud isalmost purpose built for socialmedia because it allowsorganisations to launch newservices at great speed withminimal investment risk.

Cloud computing: where

should you start?

!Scott McNealy amously

said, ‘the network is the

computer’ and so it ollows that

the network is critical to cloud

computing. Without a solid, reli-

able and resilient LAN and WAN,

your network doesn’t stand a

chance. They both exist outside

o your business and can’t unc-

tion i your network ails so be-

ore you consider deploying

cloud solutions, you should en-

sure your network is IP-ready,

secure and robust.

How do you guarantee trust in

the cloud?

! When it comes to cloud

computing, security is one

o the biggest barriers to adop-

tion. Most concerns ocus on the

location and protection o the

data itsel, but businesses should

also have a back-up plan in mind

in the event that a cloud provid-

er ails, is infiltrated, or destroyed

financially. Ensure your IT team

is ready or the change in ap-

proach and shit in levels o con-

trol and put together a mitiga-tion plan that can be implement-

ed should your cloud solution

malunction or ail.

Is cloud inevitable?

! While it’s certainly gather-

ing pace, the move to cloud

is not inevitable and it’s impor-

tant to balance the hype with a

sense o pragmatism. While there

are significant cost, e ciency

and flexibility benefits to cloud

solutions, businesses shouldn’t

necessarily decline a dedicated

non-cloud ofer; many servicescan still be ‘hosted’ of premise,

but may not cost as much.

QUESTION & ANSWER

Ken JohnsonProduct director of voice and unifiedcollaborationGlobal Crossing




Question: What can cloud ofer a business? Answer: Scalability, agility, cost-savings and more, says Mark

Botham o Bis Henderson, a recruitment company that madethe move in April

Bis Henderson is a companythat’s going places; but, until re-

cently, its IT inrastructure wascreaking. A high-end supply

chain recruitment firm, it has20 staf spread across two o-

ces: one in Northampton and an-other near Heathrow.

“We had a number o servers,all o which were getting old,”

says Mark Botham, the firm’sChie Operating Ocer. “We we-

re re-booting the system threeor our times a day because the

perormance was unbelievably bad. We had poor comms, too. Wefigured we could either spend

£30,000 or £35,000 reproducing what we currently had, or we

could make a move to cloud.”

FlexibleSo, early this year, Mark ap-

proached IT support company

Moongroup, who partnered

with cloud provider Rise in or-der to provide a flexible publiccloud solution or Bis Hender-

son. The company is now ope-rating almost all o its busi-

ness – including payroll andaccounts — in the cloud.

Yet cloud is not about being‘all in’ or ‘all out’, says Alex Hil-

ton, Managing Director at Ri-se. “There’s a hybrid proposi-

tion which allows a customerto integrate its on-premise so-

lutions with cloud,” he says.“And because cloud ollows a

pay-as-you-go model, you canscale up your capability as your requirements increase.

You can start small and growit as your business grows.”

ProductiveThis was something that ap-pealed to Mark Botham who

now knows exactly how muchTONY GREENWAY

[email protected]

LEADER TO LEADER

QUESTION & ANSWER

IT will cost the company, per

month, or each new user. Be-cause Bis Henderson is deploy-ed in a virtual private cloud, the

company is sharing physicalinrastructure; although Mark

has been impressed by the datasecurity measures in place.

“Also, as a business, we know we’re going to maintain the

latest server technology,” hesays. “We’re not going to need

various licences to operatesotware, and we have all the

latest versions; plus we’re notgoing to run out o space.

“It gave me one member o staf back immediately — so-meone who was spending

their lie looking ater our IT— and I’m now using them

much more productively within the company.”

Why migrate to

the cloud?Statistics show a business

can save in the region o 20 per cent to 50 per centin comparison with cur-

rent deployment costs.

So it’s about money?

Not entirely. Surprisingly,

INSPIRATION

We moved fromon-premise to online

’We couldeither spend£30,000 or£35,000, orwe couldmake amove tocloud’Mark BothamChief operatingofficerBis Henderson




urveys show that cloud

being adopted by com-anies because it in-

eases business agility.hat’s not about absolute

osts. It’s about operatio-al eectiveness because

oud is a shared resour-e that’s accessible all

he time.

Is cloud good

for SMEs?Yes: particularly because

they don’t have to buy ex-tra computing capacity, so

there’s no capital deploy-ment — there’s an operatio-

nal expense instead. Whenthey suddenly have lots o

data to process, they can get

more capacity on demand

rom their supplier. Cloud will grow with them, or

shrink with them, as and when they need it to.

How do you see

cloud developing?

The cloud is like a utilitycompany. In the early days

o electricity, businesses had

their own generators — butthen the grid was invented

and everyone moved ontothat. What’s happening now

is that people are moving toa grid or communications

TIM COWEN, PARTNER AT

SIDLEY AUSTIN

ENCOURAGING EXPANSIONMoving to the cloud can offer you new opportunities when itcomes to flexibility and growthPHOTO: KENTOH/SHUTTERSTOCK

Review suitabilityNot all cloud solutions arethe same. You need to know

what your requirements are be-ore you go looking.

Think about the moveGetting your data to thecloud and making it work

can be complex. You need to beable to populate your cloud pre-

sence and that may require an ini-

tial volume o data migration which may require the help o anexperienced IT migration team.

Data housekeeping Whilst storage is gettingcheaper, take this opportu-

nity to de-clutter your servers! Also, make sure you review your

local network speeds.

Use a reputable cloudYou may need to comply with

third party regulations,so kno- wing the location and security levels

or your data is always a good idea.

Check their stabilityHas your cloud hosting com-pany got a strong track record?

Are they inancially secure and go-ing to be around in 10 years? Test

their claims and certiications.

ANDY PRIDEAUX

TECHNICAL SALES DIRECTOR AT MOONCLOUD

ANDY PRIDEAUX’S TIPS

BE FLEXIBLE3

STEP




Choosing the right pathQuestion: Howstraightforward is it for a businessto move its data to the cloud?

Answer: First, you’ll haveto decide what kind of cloudinfrastructure is best for yourbusiness requirements.

The key question or any business,big

or small,used to be ‘Should we move

our data to the cloud?’ Now they are

asking ‘What kind o cloud should we

move our data to?’ That’s because

cloud inrastructure varies, explainsJohn Simcox, Director o Custom Re-

search, Europe, at international re-

search company Current Analysis.

Essentially, at a business level,

cloud oferings can be divided into

two main types: public and private.

“Public cloud is inrastructure lo-

cated of site and wholly owned and

managed by a third party,” says Sim-

cox. “And while the data or each in-

dividual customer is only available

to that customer, the applications

are shared across multiple users.”

Private cloud, says Simcox, is a

dedicated customer solution with re-

sources that are unique to that cus-tomer. It doesn’t even have to be lo-

cated of-premise, but most oten is.

AnalyseIt would, o course, be easy or SMEs

i there was a one-size-fits-all cloud

solution. Sadly, there isn’t, so stud-

ying your business needs is para-

mount beore settling on a provid-

er. “What you have to do is analyse

what your business is using and

how it is using it,” says Simcox.

“For example, do you need to

have a particular application on

your computer – or are you quite

comortable logging on to that ap-

plication in the cloud?

“The other key thing to ask is: ‘To

what extent is data my business?’

In other words, i it went missing,

what would happen? Although, it

must be said that a lot o cloud pro-

viders would argue their security

is several layers higher than the se-

curity o the average SME.

“Also, are you looking or a set o inrastructure that is uniquely dedi-

cated to you, and not used by anyone

else? That may come down to a per-

ormance issue in the end. You may

decide your business needs high per-

ormance, exclusively available to

you, 100 per cent o the time.”

HybridBusinesses can,o course,go ‘hybrid’.

As its name suggests, this can be a

combination o keeping some data

on a private cloud, some on a public

cloud, and some on premise. For an

SME, the uture is about managing

IT deployment choice (on-premise or

in-cloud), flexibility, integration be-

tween solutions and cost eectiveness.

Cloud inrastructure continues

to develop and improve. So much

so that Simcox thinks we may be

heading or a point o ‘uber per-

ormance’, where traditional PC’s

and laptops become redundant.

“I can see a time,” he says, “when

employers say to their staf: ‘Youdon’t need that laptop – you just

need one that runs a browser e-

iciently.’ Because everything

else will be handled in the cloud.”

Couple that with dramatic rise in

mobile device capability and the

launch o the new 4G networks

and the flexibility o IT consump-

tion is changed or good.

THE CHOICE IS YOURS

John Simcox discusses the options

TONY GREENWAY

[email protected]

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KNOW THEOPTIONS

4STEP




Remaining in controlQuestion: Is datamanagement easier in the cloud?

Answer: It can be becauseinformation is available to youanywhere and at any time —although, when it comes to datasecurity and search, there aremajor issues to bear in mind

Why are more businesses moving

their data to the cloud? The obvi-

ous answer is upront cost-sav-

ings - although, depending on the

provider, cloud isn’t necessarily acheap option, long-term.

What seems to be enticing busi-

nesses into the cloud is the flex-

ibility it ofers. Many see it as an

agile way or staf to access and

manage data efectively.

To this end, ‘portability’ is a big

actor in the popularity o cloud be-

cause businesses can ‘plug in and

play’ immediately. Employees don’t

have to cart all their documents

(sensitive or otherwise) around

with them on a laptop that’s creak-

ing at the seams. An entire data-

base can be stored remotely.

Driver“People want to access their data

on the move,” says May Ladd, CEO

o Vaultium, a secure online file

storage and document manage-

ment service. “That’s a key driv-

er or cloud because we all work in

a more mobile way these days. We

travel a lot more and we don’t want

to depend on a laptop or a handhelddevice in case it gets lost, broken or

stolen. By storing data in the cloud

you can access it rom anywhere.”

Assuming you have a good internet

connection, that is.

Plus, i you haven’t noticed al-

ready, we all seem to be increasingly

more time poor. That’s why manag-

ing data in the cloud seems to score

so highly: a productive business

can access it long ater its physical

premises has been locked up.

Search

Cloud can also ofer efective search- although, says Simon Bain, CEO o

technology company Simplexo -

there is a big security issue here.

“Security o your data is para-

mount,” he says. “When you choose

a cloud provider, ask: ‘How do you

store my inormation? What securi-

ty points do you have in place to stop

other people accessing my inorma-

tion? And i you provide search, how

do I know that the results coming

back aren’t someone else’s — or that

someone else isn’t getting results

back rom my inormation store? I

you don’t choose a provider proper-

ly, you could end up with your docu-

ments being shared.”

Also, make sure your cloud pr o-

vider oers some orm o dedu-

plication - only storing one copy

o, or example, an email (but in-

dexing all o them).

Arguably, a private cloud ofers

more security than a public cloud.

But whatever kind it is, data secu-

rity is a major business concernthat isn’t going away any time

soon. “I think there will be a mix-

ture o private cloud, public cloud

and hybrid,” says May Ladd. “Busi-

nesses will separate their confi-

dential inormation rom their

consumer inormation. Where

it’s confidential, they may want to

hold that internally.”

BEING FLEXIBLEMay Ladd, CEO of Vaultium talksabout the benefits of storing data inthe cloud

TONY GREENWAY

[email protected]

NEWS

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i l i i l i i l il l i i i i l L i i i i l i i



12 ·SEPTEMBER 2011 AN INDEPENDENT INSERT BY MEDIAPLANET

To succeed, diferent parts o a

business need to talk to each oth-

er constantly. That’s easy enough

when you share an o ce; but what

i some o your employees are inDundee while others are in Dela-

ware? And what about those so-

called ‘road warriors’, orever on

the move with a laptop or tablet?

They need to communicate efec-

tively with the rest o the team, too.

So could cloud usher in a new era o

IT, and ofer easy access to unified

communications? In short, could it

revolutionise collaboration — and

thus the way we do business?

ChallengesDr Yinshan Tang — Deputy Director

o the Inormatics Research Cen-tre in Henley Business School at

the University o Reading — is in

avour o cloud computing and be-

lieves it could have a great uture.

But, he cautions, there are chal-

lenges to overcome irst. He be-

lieves cloud providers need to

work together to deliver a com-

mon cloud computing standard;

plus, issues including security

and good connectivity need to be addressed.

Still, Dr Tang has exper ienced the

beneits o cloud or himsel, con-

necting to colleagues all over the

world via a cloud-based ile host-

ing service. “I use it all th e time,”

he says. “I have access through

my laptop, mobile phone, desk-

top and iPad.”

FunctionalityForward-thinking sotware houses

are developing cloud deployment

models in readiness or a new busi-

ness uture in the cloud — and be-cause they are aware that it is a key

area or new investment. Dr Tang

points out that there are two difer-

ent kinds o cloud-ready app: those

that have been developed specifi-

cally or cloud use; and existing

local installation sotware that

has been converted or cloud use.

He is a an o the ormer.

“Some local installation sotware

ofers quite a large number o unc-

tionalities,” he says. “But as a stand-

ard user, how much o those unc-

tions do you use? 100 per cent o

them? Or 10 per cent o them? Yet or

local installation, developers have

to include everything because, i

they don’t, the user may complain.”In the cloud, however, it’s pay-as-

you-go, so a provider need ofer on-

ly basic applications — ofering oth-

ers on demand as and when a user

needs extra unctionality.

There is something to be said

or businesses using apps in the

cloud, rather than have them

clogging up company hard drives.

“Not onl y that,” says Dr Tang. “I

you do have them on your laptop,

gradually you lose control when

it comes to new versions. You

don’t know which is the latest.

“Whereas in the cloud, o course, you can manage just one version.”

Question: Does cloud offernew and exciting opportunitiesfor business collaboration?

Answer: Potentially, yes —but there are still challengeswhich need to be confronted

TONY GREENWAY

[email protected]

CHANGE

Coming into a new

era of collaboration?

USING THE CLOUDBusinesses are finding outwhat opportunities cloud

can offer, and how theycan benefit from itPHOTO: SCOTTCHAN/SHUTTERSTOCK

Dr Yinshan TangDeputy director of the informaticsresearch centre atHenley BusinessSchool

INSPIRATION

Are increasing numbers of

apps ‘cloud-ready’?

!Definitely. These days, peo-

ple are accessing data rom

smartphones and rom remote

devices. You only have to look at

the recent Ocom report onsmartphone usage to realise

that the next generation is rely-

ing on leaner devices, but still

expecting a rich experience.

That expectation is absolutely

pushing applications to be

served rom the cloud.

Have software vendors re-

alised the potential of cloud-

ready apps?

!I get probably 10 phonecalls

a week rom sotware ven-

dors who have been dealing with

‘on premise’ or years but who arenow bringing out cloud versions.

When you have a company such

as Microsot investing significant

resources in cloud you cannot ig-

nore it.

Can cloud-ready apps make

a business more agile?

!The concept behind any

cloud service is that agili-

ty and lexibility are the top

beneits. At the end o the day,

the service is about technolo-

gy. I you properly embrace it

and deploy it in your business, you will get beneits.

Such as?

! A good example would be

uniied communications,

delivered out o the cloud. You can

get proper tangible cost-savings

so you can remove your PBX (Pri-

vate Branch Exchange). I you are

prepared to properly embrace it

at the business level, you can al-

low your employees to work rom

home, have a single number,

voicemail, email, deskside video

conerencing. Without cloud, theonly way to do that would be to

spend £200,000-£300,000 on kit

and install it in your o ce.

QUESTION & ANSWER

James GriffinDirector of Product Strategy,Outsourcery

CHANGE THEWAY YOU WORK6

STEP




SHOWCASE

Cutting I.T. costs

for the public sector

GOVERNMENT PLANSThe British Governent arecommitted to their move

towards the cloudPHOTO: GIANCARLO LIGUON/

SHUTTERSTOCK.COM

In its IT Strategy, published in March,

the Government stated its intention

to “push ahead with its agenda ordata centre, network, sotware and

asset consolidation and the shit to-

wards cloud computing.” In the same

month, the Ministry o Justice (MOJ)

signed a £14million deal to move

part o its services to the Govern-

ment Wide Service (GWS) platorm -

a cloud-based inrastructure. When

this is up and running, the MOJ will

become the second Whitehall de-

partment to host IT systems on the

GWS. The so-called G-Cloud project,

then, seems to be alive and well - al-

though it’s still early days.

Collaboration“The ICT Strategy also talks about

an Applications Store or Govern-

ment,” says Andy Nelson, CIO at the

Ministry o Justice. “That might

mean a standard email service

which departments can use; stand-

ard services or collaboration be-

tween departments; standard HRor finance systems.”

The Government has thought thro-

ugh how it would create such a

store, says Nelson; although it

hasn’t created it or real yet. But i

those services can be put into prac-

tice - and work across multiple

departments - then the place to

store them would be the cloud.

Cost-savingCloud is attractive to the Govern-

ment because, in these times o big

public service cuts, it could deliver

significant savings. “For me, the big-

gest driver is cost-saving,” says Nel-

son. “I in Government we have less

data centres, virtualise our servers,

standardise our inrastructure and

create an application store, then allthose things save money.

“Do I have precise figures about what

the size o the prize could be? No, I

don’t. Do I think there is a good-sized

prize to be had? Yes, I do.”

And could the public sector shit to

cloud be noticed in the field, too, by

people who actually deliver servic-

es? “I we can deliver the same IT

services with less money, then we

can protect jobs and services else-

where,” says Nelson. “So, yes, there’s

a value or people on the rontline.

And i we become more agile in

terms o service delivery, then thatalso adds value to the rontline.”

TONY GREENWAY

[email protected]

The Ministry of Justice’s move

to cloud is scheduled to be fully

operational by spring 2013

The MOJ’s ‘shared services

programme’ in the cloud is ex-pected to deliver annual savings of

£28million a year by 2014.

SOURCE: SAVVIS WWW.SAVVIS.COM

FACTS

Andy NelsonCIOMinistry of Justice

NEWS

SAVE MONEY 7

STEP

Question: Is theGovernment committed toshifting to cloud?

Answer: Yes, says AndyNelson, CIO at the Ministry of Justice - and the cost-savingscould deliver significant benefits

Does cloud represent a

significant cost-saving?

!Cloud services are, irst

and oremost, a business

model, predicated on pay-per-

use. Departments req uiring in-

termittent or bursty access toservices (oloading less criti-

cal applications to the cloud

or top-up purposes) could sig-

niicantly reduce costs using a

cloud de livery model. However,

75 per cent o enterprises re-

cently surveyed by IDG (Inter-

national Data Group) listed

business agility, rather than

cost, as the primary driver or

moving to the cloud.

When it comes to cloud us-

age, do central government

and local government de-mands differ?

! Any large organisation

can derive multiple bene-

its rom a cloud service model.

For central Government, con-

centrating computing and

storage power and running at

maximum eiciency is likely

to produce a cost saving bene-

it. Locally, at the po int o s erv-

ice delivery, agility - measured

in terms o lexibility, speed

and collaboration - is likely to

be a key beneit.

How does cloud empower

the service provider and con-

sumer at point of delivery?

!The ability to access, up-

date and process applica-

tions and data rom many dis-

persed sources and deliver it as

relevant inormation to the us-

er anywhere, using wireless

devices, gives cloud services

the potential to transorm the

quality and eectiveness o

service delivery massively in

all aspects o public services;

this covers the gamut o serv-ices rom health care and blue

light to care in the community

and education.

QUESTION & ANSWER

NigelStephensonHead of Cloud &Managed ServiceSolutionsJuniper Networks




Delivering great serviceQuestion: How can cloudhelp the public sector?

Answer: By delivering avariety of reliable services -and that means everythingfrom procurement to education

In the classrooms o the 1970s, an

overhead projector was, technolog-

ically speaking, about as cutting-

edge as it got. Since then, things

have moved on apace.

Karen O’Kane is Head o ICT atNorolk County Council, a local

authority which has used cloud

to provide the region’s primary

school sector with a secure, inter-

active learning environment.

“Young people constantly in-

teract with IT through social me-

dia such as Facebook and Twitter,”

says Karen. “So when we wanted to

interact with them through an ed-

ucational IT environment, the plat-

orm needed to be as close to their

regular experience as possible.”

ShareabilityThat’s been achieved with cloud,

says Karen, which over 100 schools

in Norolk are now using to access

a shared learning platorm.

Children have their own email ac-

counts, access to online education-

al material and a set o IT learning

tools which are low-cost because out

go the licensing expenses needed or

proprietary products. Pupils like it

because it’s a amiliar interace. O

course,with children involved,secu-

rity is paramount; but stringent sae-

guards are in place and the ‘shareabil-

ity’ the system afords is excellent.

Andy Nelson, CIO at the Minis-

try o Justice, is aware o the Norolk

project, and doesn’t think that cen-

tral government and local govern-

ment needs surrounding cloud are

that diferent. “There’s a big scale di-

erence,” he says, “but, undamen-tally, they are trying to do the same

thing: provide a standard o service.”

ImpactRonald Duncan is Technical Direc-

tor o cloud provider @UK PLC,which

recently delivered a landmark cloud

project or the public sector: GeM (the

Generic eMarketplace or higher and

urther education).GeM Marketplace

or Universities and Colleges is the on-

ly card-based national marketplace in

the world,designed to allow universi-

ties and colleges to buy products and

services rom contracted suppliers at

the correct contract price.

Ronald believes that GeM proves

cloud is cost-efective and e cient

and has a real impact on rontline

services. “[Cloud] delivers services

much more quickly,” he says. “It is

much easier to use and significant-

ly more reliable than in-house sys-

tems, since it is available 24x7x365

with multiple redundancy.”Karen O’Kane can increasing-

ly see the public sector move to-

wards cloud. One reason is resil-

ience, she says. The more critical

the service, the more saeguards

need to surround it. “And in a large

cloud-based inrastructure, there’s

a much higher level o resilience

than you can aford locally.”

HOW WE MADE ITKaren O’Kane on how NorfolkCounty Council have migratedto the cloud

TONY GREENWAY

[email protected]

NEWS

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Are you being served?Question: How can the cloudhelp organisations with their riskbalance and ensure they get aquality IT service?

Answer: Businesses can findmoving risk from an internal teamto a cloud provider attractive andthere are tools available to ensurethey do a good job.

Most organisations are attracted to

services provided through the

cloud because they ofer an option

to shit the onus o managing a sys-tem rom their own people over to

a third party who is bound by a

hosting or service level agreement.

In essence, there is a shit o ocus

rom the company’s internal IT team

to a third party provider. Within that

option, however, there are many risk

analysis questions clients will need

to ask beore they are ready to make

an inormed decision, according to IT

consultant Richard Sykes.

“I your site going down due to

excessive tra c is a concern, you

may well find the cloud is a very at-

tractive option because it is very

flexible and there is less risk o

poor perormance,” he says.

“However, organisations may

have difering security and regu-

latory concerns. I data has to be

kept within the UK, or example, a

company may be better of with a

hosting agreement within a speci-

fied mainland data centre.

“What many end up deciding is

that their internal team may have been running a very tight ship

and they can actually relax their

uptime requirements a little and

achieve a considerable saving with

a manageable exposure to risk, and

in doing so ree up their staf to o-

cus on strategic priorities.”

Service checkingOne important element o mov-

ing to the cloud is that a compa-

ny changes rom being masters

o its own IT destiny to the recipi-

ent o a service rom a third party. While the level o service expect-

ed will be enshrined in an agree-

ment with the cloud provider, the

onus then shits to the customer

to ensure the contracted service

level is ofered.

Richard Chart, EVP o Prod-

uct Management at ScienceLogic

points out that companies must

ensure they are in a position to

measure the service ofered.

“The crucial thing is a company

needs to make sure they’re moni-

toring the perormance o the serv-

ice they receive at their end, not just

what the cloud provider believes

they’re being ofered,” he says.

“Dashboard systems allow compa-

nies to monitor all their applications

in the cloud and they can even be set

up to send an alarm to an IT expert

i an application is underperorm-

ing. This can then orm the basis or a

conversation with the cloud provider.

It may be something needs reconfig-

uring or perhaps a little more band- width made available to an applica-

tion that’s been getting a lot o use.”

By monitoring perormance lev-

els organisations can get an ear-

ly ‘amber’ warning when systems

start to slow up, allowing tweaks to

applications and inrastructure to

be made beore the service alls be-

low the expected standard.

FINDING A QUALITY SERVICE

Richard Sykes discusses why cloudcould be the right option for you

SEAN HARGRAVE

[email protected]

NEWS

MANAGE THERISKS

8STEP




Aligning services is keyQuestion: How do youmanage IT services acrossmultiple platforms?

Answer: Organisations arefinding the hybrid scenario of the cloud and on premisessystems can give a singleview of their IT solutions sothey can be aligned and runmore eff iciently.

The cloud is oering cost-eec-

tive, lexible IT services that are

empowering users to accesssuites o applications ar more

powerul than they have been

used to in the past.

The allure has been too posi-

tive or many to resist. However,

the problem in the past has oten

been that divisions within a com-

pany have contracted various

SaaS solutions independently.

While some may have conerred,

other have not, and so, accord-

ing to Andrew Greenway, Cloud

Service Global Programme Lead at

Accenture, one o the cloud’s best

attributes is now in great demand.

“The big opportunity now or

companies that have already en-

tered the cloud is in managing

multiple applications so sta can

use them as i they were a single

suite,” he says.

“I think we’re going

through a period o

relection as those

who have been

among the irstto get the beneit

out o the cloud

are now seeking

to integrate di-

erent oerings

so the cloud

can be used to

provide what

appears to be

a single plat-

orm.”

Change for goodThe cloud is playing a role in en-

abling organisations to receive a

single view o their many busi-

ness applications in a single

view, or service catalogue. This

not only gives a clear picture

o what is available but can al-

so monitor disruption risks

caused by upgrade as well

as allow a single service re-

quest to be processed by

various applications, as

Ian McEwan, VP o Europeat FrontRange explains.

“Organisations have

a huge task in managing

change,” he says.

“An increasing number o

organisations have a combi-

nation o on-premise and

in-cloud solutions;

so they need to have a

central view o knock-

on eects and costs o

updates and upgrades

to one part o their IT eco-sys-

tem. They also want to save mon-

ey, and so having a service cata-

logue can enable them to be ar

more eicient. Executives can

put in one request which can

then be picked up and actioned

by the multiple applications that

can make it ha ppen, and they can

also get a report back on the

task’s progress.”

These requests can span across

an organisation’s divisions but a

typical scenario might be a newemployee. To ensure the ground

is prepared or their arrival a sin-

gle request could start o the

process o getting them on the

payroll, issuing a computer ID

and email address, booking them

in or an induction talk, ensuring

they have a phone socket and ex-

tension prepared.

SEAN HARGRAVE

[email protected]

NEWS

stepup

to a of

EMPOWERING USERS Andy Greenway discussesthe opportunities

COMBINESERVICES

9STEP




Creating a hybrid cloudQuestion: How arecompanies choosing betweenpublic and private clouds?

Answer: Many are actuallycombining both public andprivate offerings to build ahybrid cloud.

For any organisation looking to the

cloud to give staf and clients ast,flex-

ible services the main two choices

have traditionally been private (dedi-

cated resources) or public (shared re-

sources and oten delivered as Saas).In terms o choice, this is usual-

ly made based on an organisation’s

sense o risk management, control

and integration needs. Public cloud

is typically a shared end user expe-

rience with some limitations to the

configurability o the application, or

where data can be stored and is oten

used or smaller companies looking

to access new services or larger com-

panies with generic requirements.

Whereas Private Cloud tends to be a

more comortable approach or com-

panies looking to run more config-

ured applications, integrate with on-

premise capability and be assured o

data storage and sovereignty impli-

cations. Naturally, many organisa-

tions want both scenarios depend-

ing on the application, to orm hy-

brid clouds, Matthew Holmes, Chair

o the British Sotware Developer As-

sociation’s Special Interest Group or

Cloud Computing and CEO o Liquid

Accounts commented.

“Companies are seeing the ben-efits o cloud computing” he says.

“You can be up and running within

a ew minutes and the services are

easy to configure. However, there

are some applications that have data

that is considered by some to be too

sensitive or the public cloud, compa-

nies want to eel there is extra secu-

rity around it.

“So the really huge opportunity in

the sector, at the moment, is in pro-

viding interoperability between pub-

lic and private clouds. That way you

can build a hybrid which bridges pub-lic and private cloud applications so a

company gets the best o both worlds.”

Best of both A major consideration or many or-

ganisations is the need to get the

most o their existing IT inrastruc-

ture and sotware licensing and so

oten a decision is made to utilise an

existing server room or data centre.

According to Russell Payne, Cloud Al-

liance Manager at Phoenix Sotware,

this is understandable but does not

restrict an organisations ability to

embrace the cloud.

“A lot o organisations need to get

the most out o their inrastructure

so they may preer a private cloud

where they have more control over

data and applications,” he says.

“However, they may also want to

split services between those that are

sensitive and those where they want

to take advantage o the speed and

cost savings in the public cloud. They

may allow email to go on the publiccloud but keep their CRM systems on

a private cloud, or example.

“It’s worth noting, o course, that the

cloud, where registered users can get

access to data on the move without

having to store it in portable drives,

is ar saer than having employees

roaming the country with USB mem-

ory sticks they may lose.”

Matthew Holmes discusses thechoices you have to make

SEAN HARGRAVE

[email protected]

NEWS

With more than 20 years’ software

reselling experience, Phoenix Software is

perfectly positioned to help your

organisation assess, plan for and achieve

the benefits of cloud computing alongside

your existing investments in IT.

Through our extensive licensing knowledge

and deployment and support services, we

have the right skills to help you realise your

IT strategy, cost effectively and in a

framework that maintains your flexibility

and control.

Image Copyright 'qushe', 2011. Used under licence from Shutterstock.com.

Phoenix Software Limited is a company registered in England and Wales, with company number 2548628. Phoenix Software Limited is a trading subsidiary of Blenheim Group Limited. Registered Address - Blenheim House, York Road, Pocklington, York, YO42 1NS.

Trading Address - Blenheim House, York Road, Pocklington, York, YO42 1NS. Email – [email protected]. VAT Number – GB 755 3490 15

To arrange a no-obligation discussion

with the Phoenix Cloud Services Team,

call 0845 265 1265

or email [email protected]

Visit www.phoenixs.co.uk/cloud

MAKE THERIGHT CHOICE

10STEP



If Cloud is

on your agendathen you need to

take a look at ours…

© 2011 Gartner, Inc. and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Gartner is a registered trademark of Gartner, Inc. or its affiliates.

For more information, e-mail [email protected] or visit gartner.com.

Intense hype still surrounds cloud computing. Cut through the hype with Gartner. Two forthcoming events

will provide you with a holistic view of Cloud Computing covering topics ranging from security to public

and private Cloud infrastructure.

For more information and to view the full

agenda visit: europe.gartner.com/datacenter

For more information and to view the full agenda

visit: europe.gartner.com/security

If Cloud Security is your focus area…

and services

Attend the Gartner Security & Risk Management

Summit, 19-20 September 2011, Lancaster

London Hotel, London.

If Cloud Infrastructure is your focus area…

Self-service Provisioning, Capacity Management

Attend the Gartner Data Center & IT Operations

Summit, 28-29 November 2011, Park Plaza

Westminster Bridge, London.

The Future of IT Sept 11

Documents

Transcript of The Future of IT Sept 11