Microsoft's Cloud Plan
Microsoft's cloud computing strategy is a tale of two clouds. There are its popular software-as-a-service offerings: SharePoint, Exchange, Dynamics CRM, and the soon-to-be-released new Web version of Office 2010. And there's Microsoft's emerging platform as a service, Azure.
How quickly and easily customers adopt these offerings is an open question, but Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, in an interview at the company's Redmond, Wash., headquarters, says that every CIO he talks to is at least considering the move. And just in case they aren't, all of Microsoft's 2,000 account managers are being required to make a cloud pitch to each of their customers.
One of the main cogs of Microsoft's cloud strategy is Azure, its approach to selling computing power over the Internet based on usage, as customers need it. Microsoft has some enterprise customers such as Kelley Blue Book and Domino's testing key Web applications on Azure, and some smaller tech companies--including SugarCRM--sell software services running on the platform. But Azure continues to be a work in progress.
Azure is a long-term bet because, for it to be a blockbuster the way Microsoft envisions, software needs to be written differently--just as Web apps are different from client-server apps, which are different from mainframe software. Microsoft sees the switch to cloud development as being as significant as those earlier generational shifts. Developers will write applications, for example, so they take advantage of key features of a cloud architecture.
Table of Contents
Microsoft's Cloud Plan
About the Author
Chris Murphy is editor of InformationWeek, where he has worked as an editor and writer since 1999. Before joining InformationWeek, he was editor of the Budapest Business Journal, a business weekly in Hungary, and a daily newspaper reporter in Grand Rapids, Mich. Chris holds a BA in Economics and Journalism from Michigan State University and an MBA from the University of Virginia.
|
Thread View | Flat View | 1Comments |
 Secure Collaboration?Comment by ANON1244670452287 May-25,2010 11:54:44 AMThis article and the MS strategy have made this CIO a bit uneasy. Security, Rights Management and Data Loss Prevention seem to be conspicuously absent from the “strategy”. In my opinion the biggest risk in going to the “cloud” is what can leak out during the collaboration. I would like to see how we can securely collaborate and protect the content of documents from leaking out…I’ll skip, 1.x, 2.x and possibly consider 3.x.Reply |
