Entertainment in the Cloud!

Entertainment industry is one of the hottest industries where millions are made & lost...Why should it not adopt to the latest & the greatest technologies? So there you go! This industry is rapidly adopting the Cloud Services in many many ways...When you are in a movie theater, you may not realize that so much of IT is needed to produce a single movie. Or for that matter, the computer / phone games that you play..have you ever stopped to think what is involved in creating a game? Oh yes, you guessed it right. A lot of hard work coupled with some serious piece of IT components including machines, software, hosted platforms and yes, Cloud Services!

So you would have a question as to how are Cloud Services related to the Entertainment Industry?

In fact, Cloud is the way to go for this industry, right from Content creation, to content processing (encoding / transcoding), to content delivery via streaming video and content management, storage for the huge media files, raw processing power provided by extensible resources on the cloud and the list goes on. 

Sony's "Music Unlimited by Qriocity" service on the Cloud, is being extended to France, Germany, Spain and Italy that is a subscription based service to enable fans to access music on their digital devices. This cloud service acts as a "locker" for a subscriber's own music collection so that they can access their music on different devices.

Apple has signed a cloud-music licensing agreement with EMI Music and is very near to completing deals with Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment. One of the core features of a cloud music service is enabling consumers to store their songs on a company's servers. They can then access their libraries from Web-connected devices.

DreamWorks, one of the top movie studios in the world has signed up a multi-year deal with a Cloud Service provider that will allow DreamWorks to render computer animated films using elastic computing resources. Elastic cloud computing allows users to adjust computing capacity to meet their real-time needs.

You would be surprised to know that even the Adult Entertainment industry has taken a massive leap into the cloud by providing storage and playback of movies and video clips using a locker concept on their cloud servers!

Gaming on Demand, that delivers the latest high-end gaming titles over home broadband Internet to the TV and entry-level PCs and Macintosh® computers, is another cloud based service that is now making a ton of money. There are many players in this space and the number keeps growing everyday. OnLive is one of the biggest players in this segment competing directly with Sony, Nintendo & Microsoft's of this world! Other providers include Gaikai.com,Spoon.net and a whole bunch of others!

More and more people are getting rid of their cable service or their satellite services and moving to content on demand for their television, movies, games.  Music, movies and eBooks are all being delivered over the web to any number of platforms.  The Cloud makes this possible and should be an integral part of the Entertainment industry's strategy! 
Also posted on BMC Communities blog - Cloud-n-more 

Cloud Services in Healthcare

What are the commercially available SaaS-based Cloud solutions for the Healthcare industry?
Cloud services are increasingly becoming popular in the Healthcare industry. And yes, they are starting to become a lot more common. One example is a New Zealand company called HSA Global, which has a solution called Collaborative Care Management System (CCMS). This is entirely based on Microsoft's Windows Azure cloud platform and focuses on shared care management, is fully integrated electronic health record and clinical case management solution that enables healthcare organizations to improve client care while creating clinical and business efficiencies. It enables people from different organizations to share and manage patients' health records, which ultimately bring convenience to the patients as well.

Dell has rolled out the Dell's Healthcare Cloud Services at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) in Feb 2011 conference in Orlando, that is a subscription-based private cloud services for healthcare providers. These cloud services will provide a more streamlined access to patients’ archived information for easier sharing and management of the information between physicians, hospitals and other point of care. These new cloud services stem from Dell’s newest acquisitions of medical archiving InSite One, that provided healthcare providers medical data image archives through Dell’s Unified Clinical Archiving (UCA) private cloud services. Partnerships with Microsoft Amalga health intelligence platform to provide medical records analytics capabilities that will help healthcare providers manage and consolidate patients’ records. Dell also added security features to the analytics cloud offering with the acquisition of Secureworks, to provide compliance with Federal and State Health Care data reporting requirements.

Microsoft is also continuing to aggressively invest in interoperability and connectivity functionality, free of charge, making it continually easier for patients to upload and track their health data. Some of this functionality comes from interfacing with common health devices such as blood pressure monitors, pedometers, glucometers and even digital Images. Microsoft also offers HealthVault services through Windows Azure platform. HealthVault supports native DICOM (digital imaging) as part of the HealthVault connectivity feature. Their partners range from CVS, Aetna, Quest, and few others, which allow patients the ability to retrieve some of their data across the internet in order to develop a comprehensive patient record without a lot of manual work.

iSOFT's Lorenzo solutions enable collaboration and interoperability across all sectors of care and remove traditional barriers to sharing health related information and electronic record management. Lorenzo creates virtual health networks that securely connect doctors, care facilities and patients while protecting the organizations’ previous investments by integrating seamlessly with the existing systems. 


There are many other Cloud Service providers in the market and the competition is heating up!


So what are the topmost barriers for the adoption of cloud services in the healthcare sector?

• Control: Moving to the cloud allows a healthcare organization to focus on new projects or enhancements, as the organization no longer has to deploy and manage parts of their infrastructure. But it takes time for Cloud Service providers to earn that trust and for organizations to hand over the control over the management and deployment of IT. 
• Security & Privacy: Organizations, specially in the Healthcare industry, take time to be able to feel comfortable with cloud service providers and let them protect and secure the organization's confidential information. In reality, the amount of effort and engineering that goes into ensuring cloud services provides the best privacy and security is second to none, and most organizations would struggle if they try to match the engineering that is required to run a service like this internally.
• Data Sovereignty: This is an issue that is heard a lot from customers who are uncomfortable about their data being hosted in data centers overseas. While some countries have strong privacy laws that require information of its citizens to be kept on shore, some other countries do not.
• Lack of Standards: With respect to digital imaging, DICOM has been the predominant format for almost every system out there. This made it very simple for organizations to simply just start pushing or pulling images over the wire. When it comes to health records, however, there are some challenges. Since not all public & private healthcare providers can agree on one single standard, it remains a challenge for many to decide whether it is going to be CCD or CCR standards. Google Health, for example supports a subset of the CCR, while Microsoft HealthVault supports the entire standards set.

References: Microsoft, Dell, iSoft, HSAGlobal's web sites. 
Also published on BMC Communities blog - Cloud-n-more 

Cloud in the Automotive Industry

Automotive industry is bracing cloud-based technologies in a rapid wave. Along with green technology advances, cloud technology advances in automotive industry are the key to the progress of the industry. Ranging from GPS system to vehicle tracking system, cloud computing allows businesses in the automotive sector to deliver better and offer more to the end customers. I have listed a few case studies from the Auto sector to give you an insight into how the cloud technology is being used, right from in-car infotainment to supply chain management by these giants to transform their businesses.

Toyota is going to team up with the Microsoft Azure Cloud Platform to deliver various services related to automobile building activities. Microsoft and Toyota are supposed to stick $12 million in Toyota Media Services to develop diagnostic and GPS data for cars, developing a whole global cloud platform for "telematics" by 2015. Toyota means to open the platform to other car makers. Growing enterprise adoption of Cloud Platform is good news, especially for the automobile industry which is at a crossroads and trying to become profitable again. Interesting article by Srinivasan Sundara Rajan

Infosys was looking at revitalizing its auto dealer solution to address flexibility & scalability requirements as well as to simplify the process of sharing inventory & other data  between dealerships in a network and with their original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). They built this system by leveraging the cloud based Microsoft Services Platform along with Microsoft SQL Data Services.

Ford MyTouch uses cloud to help turn its vehicles into mobile communications hubs -  Source: “Ford Rewires Cars for Connectivity” — CMP TechWeb. 7 January 2010
In January 2010, Ford unveiled its new cloud-based MyTouch system at the CES show in Las Vegas. The new program brings hightech applications, WiFi capability, and the second generation of Microsoft's SYNC software into Ford vehicles. MyTouch will first feature in the 2011 Lincoln MXK, followed by the company’s other Lincoln and Ford vehicles. It will have several advanced telematics services that will be standard on new vehicles equipped with MyTouch and its SYNC communications and entertainment platform. These services include enhanced touch and voice access, Wi-Fi connections, cloud service connectivity, and pre-installed web applications such as Twitter and Pandora. Ford's vision for SYNC is to connect customers with families and friends, with their personal devices, and with the data they have stored in the cloud. And all while keeping their eyes on the road and their hands on the wheel.

Daimler uses cloud to connect with its supplier network Sources: Accenture Research Analysis; Factiva; “Compuware Covisint Extends Global Supplier Portal Contract with Daimler AG” — GlobeNewswire. 16 June 2009
In 2009, Daimler extended its agreement with Compuware’s Covisint group to build and maintain a comprehensive portal and identity management solution that securely connects Daimler with its vast network of suppliers globally. Covisint provides Daimler and its suppliers with an industry-standard connectivity and  security solution — including single-sign-on in a cloud computing, SaaS model — enabling seamless and secure collaboration for critical-business information. Together with Covisint, they plan to further leverage the latest Web 2.0 features and, in a systematic approach, look for solutions to bring the communication with their suppliers to the next level.

Also published on BMC Communities blog - Cloud-n-more

Cloud Services for Universities & Colleges

Many Universities and Colleges are moving to the Cloud Services to save costs and provide more facilities for the students.

Curtin University, Perth Australia moves more services to the Cloud with Windows Azure.
Copenhagen Business School moves to the Cloud. They recently switched their student email to the Cloud, using Live@edu.

DFEEST (Department of Further Education Employment Science and Technology) wanted to build a new messaging platform for their 85,000 staff and students, either using their existing Novell Groupwise solution, or using an external email service. They evaluated Google & Microsoft and chose Microsoft's Live@edu. The big benefit for DFEEST is that they're saving money, at the same time as delivering a better services to their users.

The Business School at Brno University of Technology, in the Czech Republic, is one of the universities moving to Cloud services, to enable 4,000 students to connect to their learning whilst they are away from campus. They're using the Microsoft BPOS (Business Productivity Online Services) system to connect e-learning to their students in employment, and in other countries including the UK and the US. What they've found is that it gives their students more opportunities for learning, at the same time as helping them deliver a more flexible service within their limited IT budget. And a significant result for them is that they are able to do this with no more staff resources - leaving them to focus on the quality of teaching and learning.

The School of International Relations at the Economics University in Prague is another of the universities moving to Cloud services, as they have moved students studying IT management to the BPOS Cloud services.

By choosing to move to the Cloud, all these universities have claimed to have speeded up their deployment, which in turns speeds up access to educational resources for their students. They've also reduced their cost of ownership, by not having to rely on the existing university infrastructure.

Universities and Colleges are becoming a big business hub for Cloud Service Providers and the competition in this segment is heating up very rapidly!

References: Microsoft Case Studies on www.Microsoft.com
Also published on BMC Communities blog - Cloud-n-more

How did Cloud Computing evolve?

There were a number of dynamics involved in contributing to the evolution of Cloud Computing. Virtualization technologies, high-bandwidth internet & communication technologies, delivery of enterprise apps, software inter-operability standards, Web 2.0 were some of the key influencing factors for the emergence of the "CLOUD" world!

In 1999, the face of Cloud Computing entered the corporate world with the introduction of SalesForce.com to deliver Enterprise Applications over the internet. This marked the beginning of Software As A Service (SaaS). In 2006, Infrastructure As A Service (IaaS) and Platform As A Service (PaaS) were introduced by Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) commercial web service. In 2009, Google & Microsoft entered into the foray of offering enterprise application services!

Is Cloud Computing the same as Grid Computing?
Not really! Grid Computing uses distributed virtual machines to usually complete a focused single large task, whereas Cloud Computing also uses distributed virtual machines to to complete different types of tasks!

Is Cloud Computing the same as Software As A Service?
Not really! Software As A Service (SaaS) is a software that an organization can purchase and use & it can reside on the user's machines or machines owned by a service provider. SaaS is one of the sub-sets of Cloud Computing.

Is Cloud Computing the same as Virtualization?
Not really! Virtualization can be used to implement Cloud computing.

Is Cloud Computing the same as Service Oriented Architecture?
Not really! Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) supports data exchange among different applications that are a part of a business process.

All the above perceived synonyms (not exactly synonyms!) are used with reference to Cloud Computing, but they should not be confused with Cloud Computing as they are sub-sets or bits & pieces of the Cloud Computing world!

More on this tomorrow!