Much of the discussion in the cloud computing industry is centered on cloud infrastructure services (a.k.a. infrastructure as a service or IaaS). One popular topic has been the benefits derived from cloud computing. For cloud infrastructure services in particular, cost reduction and agility are two of the most talked about benefits. And they are not without controversy.

Cost Savings

Some argue that public cloud services cost more than on-premise services, cloud-based or otherwise. Others argue that public cloud services are actually less expensive. Of course examples of both cases can be found. In situations such as this it is really best not to argue in generalities. Those adopting cloud services should instead focus on the specific scenarios where the attributes of cloud computing produce benefits for them.

This blog entry was initially posted at the Service Catalog Community and Blog website. Rodrigo Flores, Founder and CTO of newScale, Inc., was kind enough to let me post a guest blog there. Check out that site for great information on service catalogs (of course!), self-service, and much more.

The role of self-service in cloud computing has become increasingly clear over the last year or two. It didn’t hurt, for instance, that the Draft Working Definition of Cloud Computing from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) specified “on-demand self-service” as one of the essential characteristics of cloud computing. Yet, more importantly, members of IT organizations that have taken the time to consider the benefits of cloud computing seem to have internalized the idea that cloud services provide greater control and agility.

Overview

While many questions remain about this evolving space, there is growing evidence about what cloud infrastructure services (aka cloud-based infrastructure as a service or IaaS) and its cousins, shared and dedicated hosting, will become. Simply put, the idea of cloud infrastructure services as something separate and distinct from these other hosted services will fade, and customers will gain more flexibility and agility across all their hosting services.

Some Roots of Innovation

It is still early days in the cloud computing industry, yet new startup businesses supplying cloud enabling technologies are popping up like mushrooms after a rain. While they will not all succeed, they all believe they have an opportunity to grow and profit in this space. At the same time, traditional hosting service providers are extending their offerings beyond shared, dedicated and virtual private servers. They see the opportunities which cloud-based infrastructure as a service (IaaS) promise: rapid growth, high margins, access to new customers, and more. Of course the service providers have more than new opportunities on their minds. For them it is about survival.

Nearly a year ago I wrote a blog post called The Cloud Computing Industry Segments. It made an initial pass at describing the cloud computing industry segments. As mentioned in that post, this is a somewhat tricky proposition since cloud computing products, services and technologies are all evolving so quickly. It is now time for an update.

Neovise started by using three “super-segments”

1. Cloud Services – including IaaS, PaaS, SaaS

On May 5, 2010, HP announced that Bill Veghte has been appointed executive vice president of the company’s Software and Solutions business, effective May 17. As a follow-on to the previous post, this raises a new question. Can and will HP build a broad software business?

Larry Dignan posted an interesting question and related blog post here: http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=33911

I love article titles that include a question mark. So inviting for response! So that is just what I've done here:

However, before answering the large question, a number of smaller questions raised in the article must also be addressed. A couple more points also need to be made.

The article states:
>Add it up and HP owns a piece of every part of the information technology stack now.

There remains at least one major hole in the HP stack: software. True, the article said HP owns a *piece* of every part of the IT stack. However, that is mostly IT management software and systems software sold with its hardware. HP is greatly lacking when it comes to applications as well as middleware. Yet it would seem that software is one of the greatest opportunities for revenue growth as well as increasing margins for HP. Strange they aren’t doing more here it? More on this later…

Understanding the Cloud Enabling Platform

Some readers may know that the Neovise website provides a number of resources for finding, understanding and selecting cloud computing services as well as cloud enabling technologies. Within the pages of the above resources link there is a page called IaaS Enabling Platforms.

Carpathia Hosting just announced it has teamed up with Citrix® Systems, Inc. to launch the second generation of its enterprise cloud offering, Carpathia InstantOn™. The announcement looks exciting for at least a couple reasons. First, Carpathia is communicating a focus on Citrix XenServer™ rather than VMware or other hypervisors. Of course Carpathia will remain hypervisor agnostic to some degree, allowing customers freedom of choice. Still, this is a big win for Citrix. The second big news is the launch of the second generation InstantOn cloud computing solution from Carpathia.

Background

Earlier posts have discussed some of the strategies that can be followed by infrastructure as a service (IaaS) providers. At a high level, IaaS strategies are typically based on some mix of low price (offering lowest prices per unit of value), high differentiation (offering unique capabilities), and focus (selling to a more narrow group of customers).