Cloud Computing Economics and Trends

Cloud and grid computing are concepts that have been around for quite some time. Yet, they have received significant attention and media focus in recent years as these ideas have moved beyond mere conceptualization and into real and readily available applications and services, with innovations in these areas being continually developed.

The shift toward cloud computing includes such developments as the creation of data centers and software applications being delivered over the cloud. The sharing of these resources provides greater, more efficient utilization of these resources and is a crucial factor in the expansion of cloud computing. The scalability of resources and the ease of use through the dynamic provisioning of resources are examples of factors that play an important role in cloud computing trends today.

For this Discussion, you will discuss the benefits of cloud computing, evaluate some of the economic models of cloud computing, and analyze current cloud computing trends.

To Prepare:

Read this week’s textbook chapter and journal articles.
Submit a 600-word post that includes the following:

Compare cloud computing economic models. What are they based on, how are they related, and what differentiates them?

Compare the economic model of cloud computing with other models of computing, such as distributed and client-server models. Is cloud computing beneficial to all users?

List 3–5 current trends in cloud computing. In what areas are these trends occurring? How will they impact society?

How can Chief Technology Officers (CTOs) and Information Technology

Management prepares for and exploits these trends?

SAMPLE SOLUTION

The cloud computing economic model is based on the Pay as You Go method. In this method, the customer is required to pay their way to the usage of cloud computing (Pal & Hui, 2013). This model is beneficial to the users, and the cloud is economically viable or convenient to both the users and the service providers. The models also help avoid some of the indirect costs generated by assets such as licensing of software and the support team (Pal & Hui, 2013). Therefore, with cloud software, one can use the application on a subscription basis without additional cost since the property provides services and is still in the hands of the cloud providers. One of the widely applied economic models for cloud computing is the client-server model. The client-server model is a distributed application structure that partitions workloads or various tasks between service providers or resources (Maata et al., 2017). In the client-server system, the user interacts with the system or the…