September 30, 2010 - Early Adopters Running 60-70% of Business Apps In the Cloud

Early Adopters Running 60-70% of Business Apps In the Cloud

Armada Group and Cloud.com Convene Executive Advisory Council to Bring Together Leading Cloud innovators

SAN FRANCISCO, CA, September 30, 2010 - Cloud computing innovators from Armada, Cloud.com, RightScale, Apigee and enStratus hosted the first Executive Advisory Council on Cloud Computing during VMworld 2010 in San Francisco, concluding that early adopters are now deploying 60 to 70 percent of their business applications in the cloud. Panelists and attendees from CA, Cisco, Salesforce.com, Microsoft, Oracle, Netflix, VMware, Joyent, OpSource, Nvidia, SOASTA, Cloudkick and others agreed that assessing an application's needs for dynamic scalability, requirements for specialized optimization and suitability for a cloud or dedicated environment helps determine whether the cloud is the right solution.

Discussion was lively during the behind-the-scenes event held in conjunction with VMworld 2010, as attendees explored and debated the key issues that are defining the future of cloud computing. Moderated by Dave Nielsen of Cloud Camp, Executive Advisory Council panelists in the rapid-fire "UnPanel" format addressed questions including:

• How do you optimize an application in the cloud?
• What are the most competitive cloud computing offerings?
• What can help us simplify growing complexities in the cloud?
• What happens when the cloud breaks?
• How do cloud providers deal with audits of cloud computing requested by clients?
• In terms of initial adoption, will customers go with a public or private cloud first?
• What is a real ROI of cloud computing?

Key Findings
Top-level conclusions from the Executive Advisory Council on Cloud Computing included:

• The cloud requires sound applications with good functional composition. There is no substitute for good programming. Legacy applications may need to be re-factored to run optimally in the cloud. It's critical to conduct a thorough functional analysis of how a new application is designed for the cloud paradigm.
• Amazon Web Services is at least two years ahead of competitors in features and functionality. Going forward, there is no clear number two. Many people think that Microsoft will eventually compete just as they have done in the past in other markets.
• Today, there are tools available that create templates, patterns and standard architectures for simplifying deployment to the cloud. For example, companies such as enStratus and RightScale provide tools that enable companies to deploy applications in the cloud rapidly and efficiently.
• The cloud does break. Everyone is adjusting to the new environment and dealing with multiple players in the cloud delivery chain. Who is really responsible and how do you define SLAs? The industry is still trying to figure this out. Disaster recovery and replicated sites are practical approaches that are easier to achieve in the cloud than with your own infrastructure and your own IT department.
• If your company is large enough, you may have economies of scale that justify building your own private cloud. For smaller companies, it absolutely makes sense to use a public cloud. Fast forward three to five years: As people get more comfortable with cloud computing and the industry matures, public clouds will come to the forefront in the enterprise.
• Although only an estimated two percent of enterprise applications are running in the cloud today, early adopters, such as Netflix, have 60 to 70 percent of their applications running in the cloud. The cloud model enables businesses to take a fresh look at the value of maintaining legacy applications or refactoring them for the cloud. If you are developing a new application, architecting it for the cloud from the start is the way to go.

"Armada helps leading enterprises make informed decisions and leverage the value of the cloud in the most effective manner possible. The cloud computing innovators at our Executive Advisory Council validated what we are seeing from our customers - they are moving aggressively to refactor their critical business applications to harness the cloud's tremendous efficiencies," said Jeff Tavangar, President, The Armada Group.

A report from the Executive Advisory Council on Cloud Computing is available at http://thearmadagroup.com/eac-results.html. Follow up surveys showed that 100 percent of the responding attendees would attend a subsequent panel and would like to further explore cloud topics including, Platform as a Service (PaaS), Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), virtualization in the cloud, and the impact of social networking.

About Armada
Since 1995, The Armada Group has been a premier Silicon Valley-based professional services firm that helps companies implement their next-generation technology strategy. As a trusted advisor to leading global technology companies such as Cisco, Paypal and eBay, Armada delivers the resources and advice to build smart, scalable technology infrastructure that leverages best practices, technology and business models to promote your company's growth. For more information, please visit http://thearmadagroup.com.

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The Armada Group
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