What is Cloud Computing?

Cloud Computing has a pretty loose definition to the centralisation of IT equipment into a ‘farm’ to provide a service(s) to multiple people normally across the internet.

What can Cloud Computing Do For My Business?

Cloud Computing is starting to transform the overall design of today’s IT systems adding great levels of flexibility as to where and when you can access your data, whilst taking away the unnecessary expense of owning and managing your own IT infrastructure.

Cloud computing has been the hype in the IT industry for a while now and most business people are starting to cotton onto the concept and have started to push Cloud into their IT departments. But in the business would there seems to be a lack of understanding as to what cloud computing is and what it can actually achieve for business.

For people in the know, the positive economics of Cloud computing can be beneficial to business in a similar way to any other form of outsourcing. The reduction of overheads and the added levels of accountability are definitely the very viewable benefits, but there still remains a number of intangible benefits people are yet to discover.

I hear Cloud Computing can save money...

Cloud Computing providers can achieve economies of scale which reduce the total cost of ownership (TCO) of an IT system on the users. The TCO is lower in a cloud environment because the MSP providing the Cloud Computing services are able to use higher equipment density, increased IT equipment utilisation and share infrastructure between many clients concurrently.

Rather than having a dedicated system for each client, where the overall utilisation of equipment is low and the overheads of management & support are high, a Cloud Computing system tends to be lean and specific task specific. Services for multiple clients are placed into the cloud and only the resources needed to provide the service are allocated to the client, hence eliminating under-utilised equipment and saving cost.

Limitations of Cloud Computing

The idea of Cloud Computing is a very efficient, but has so far been somewhat rigid in it’s feature set. SalesForce and Gmail are great examples to the rigidity of Cloud Computing thus far. Both SalesForce and Gmail are very task and focus driven. They set out to achieve specific goals and do so very well, but leave the remainder of a company’s IT system alone and outside the cloud.
Presently the big players are starting to move into collaboration between multiple Cloud Computing platforms, but it still seems like the iPhone/iPad – locked down with no true data sharing between applications.

Cloud Computing’s rigidity has taken some of the traditionally expected features away from users. Being able to share, to copy and paste between systems and to have access to your data when offline etc.

Precision IT’s Cloud Computing (SRO)

We here at Precision IT have been thinking about these limitations and have designed our Cloud Computing platform which we call SRO (Secure Remote Office).

Using the latest Microsoft and VMware technology we have built our cloud system to provide the greatest flexibility to businesses of all shapes and sizes, without removing the traditionally expected features of their old IT systems.

The Precision IT SRO system is a Terminal Services environment where your business can host and operate all of your normal business applications with the same positive economic benefits as all of the other Cloud Computing services.

Precision IT’s SRO has some significant benefits to business including:

Reduced upfront capital outlay for IT infrastructure. The SRO service is provided as a monthly subscription based on the number of staff you have.
Reduced IT support costs. All infrastructure is owned, operated and supported by Precision IT.
Increased data accessibility for staff in branch and remote office locations. All company data and IT systems are accessible from anywhere via the internet. SRO evens works very well internationally or on 3G wireless cards.
High levels of scalability as the SRO system can easily expand on demand as your business grows. There are no upfront equipment, licensing or infrastructure costs associated with adding more staff.
No IT infrastructure equipment needed onsite. Your only need an internet modem/router onsite to provide internet access. No storage room needed for servers and network equipment.
99.9% Uptime guarantee with SRO ensures that your business is not going to be impacted by IT outages and problems. The SRO system runs on redundant high-end HP equipment, which significantly reduces the risk of failure and thereafter business interruption.