There are those who believe cloud computing will produce a handful of dominant providers, and others who see the evolution of a complex, multi-layered cloud computing ecosystem. This week there’s been some interesting discussion of the prospects for cloud providers that do one thing in a compelling fashion. Here’s a look:
- Stacey at GigaOm [1] writes about HP’s view of the cloud: “HP appears to see the benefits of cloud computing as a way for vendors to deliver a single service, kind of like having a single chef make the world’s supply of macaroni and cheese,” Stacey writes. “The providers behind these monolithic clouds could scale while still making a profit and offer service guarantees because they would control the infrastructure.”
- Gartner’s Lydia Leong [2] is skeptical: “I think that it’s highly-unlikely that we’ll see super-specialization in the cloud,” she writes. “There are, of course, software vendors today who make highly specialized components … But as software companies get more ambitious, the scope of their software tends to broaden, too. … I don’t think successful software companies will confine themselves to delivering single applications as a service.”
Rich Miller is the founder and editor-in-chief of Data Center Knowledge, and has been reporting on the data center sector since 2000. He has tracked the growing impact of high-density computing on the power and cooling of data centers, and the resulting push for improved energy efficiency in these facilities.
Article printed from Data Center Knowledge: http://www.datacenterknowledge.com
URL to article: http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2009/02/24/single-purpose-clouds-pro-and-con/
URLs in this post:
[1] GigaOm: http://gigaom.com/2009/02/20/hp-not-so-sure-about-ec2/
[2] Lydia Leong: http://cloudpundit.com/2009/02/23/single-function-clouds-are-unlikely/
[3] Rich Miller: http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/author/richm/
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