The
cloud market is changing. As adoption becomes mainstream, more and more
providers are jumping on board to provide a range of services — once Amazon's
bailiwick, Tech Target notes that the retail giant is now under challenge from
players like Google, IBM and HP while new entrants such as Chinese giant
Alibaba look to make their mark.
All this cloud interest means there are a host
of new management technologies in development; here are four key trends to
watch this year:
Vertical
SaaS
The
Software as a Service (SaaS) market continues to grow, and according to Enterprise
Irregulars global SaaS revenues are set to reach $106 billion by 2016. However,
as discussed by Information Management, there's a shift happening: As-a-service
tools are starting to go vertical. Through 2015, expect that all the familiar
standards — CRM, ERP, analytics — will continue to see strong growth, but
chances are that vendors will take a more focused approach to SaaS moving forward
as a way to target specific verticals. These include finance, health care, law
and even manufacturing; public and private clouds have matured enough that this
kind of specialization is now possible. What's more, the price war between
Google, Amazon and other vendors is helping to make these kind of focused
deployments even more affordable for companies just starting their transition
to the cloud.
Turnkey
Migration
According
to a recent Search Cloud Computing article, another key trend in cloud management
is migration. At a basic level this includes app migration — tools and
approaches developed to make moving legacy apps a simpler and more streamlined
process. This also extends to migration as a whole; providers are now willing
to invest in making cloud migration a “turnkey” process, eliminating the need
for lengthy deployments and uncertain timelines. In many cases the success of
this trend rests with specialized vendors, for example, hosted PBX providers,
which have developed solutions to work across a variety of cloud deployments
and legacy systems. The sophistication of cloud infrastructure now makes it
possible to deliver solutions which combine easy migration and use.
Off-Site
Innovation
Another
key trend to expect this year? More off-site innovation. As noted by Forbes,
the nature of research and development (R&D) is changing. Companies are no
longer dependent on in-house IT professionals to innovate the apps and
platforms from end to end; it's now possible to leverage work done by other IT
shops to form the basis of new computing solutions. Through 2015, expect the
speed and sophistication of this innovation to increase, allowing companies to
devote more of their IT budget to refining mission-critical apps and developing
niche feature sets rather than starting from scratch with each new software
tool.
Security
at Scale
The
last key trend for 2015 lies with security. Always a hot-button topic around
the cloud, Information Age suggests that it's now possible for cloud vendors to
get ahead of the security discussion and provide consumers with a new level of
confidence. Bottom line? Cloud providers have the scale of resources, depth of
knowledge and breadth of skill to create best-in-class security solutions. As
more vendors take a proactive approach to cloud security, expect to see this
market diversify and innovate, prompting a shift in IT security thinking as a
whole. In effect, the right management strategy here can turn the supposed
liability of cloud security into an asset, since the scale of provider
technology makes it possible to offer much more robust, end-to-end protection.
2015
should be a banner year for management technologies as vendors spend on
innovation and companies commit IT budgets to the cloud. Four large trends are
already on the horizon: Vertical SaaS, turnkey migration, off-site innovation
and an evolved security landscape.
This is a Guest Post.
About the Author
Sheldon Smith is the current Senior Product Manager for XO Communications. In addition to his experience heading up the
Hosted PBX and Conferencing products divisions at XO, he also has over 10 years
of Department and Process Management experience.
