Virtually Speaking

Dan Kusnetzky, Paula Rooney and Ken Hess

Gartner: customers still don't get cloud computing

By | August 16, 2010, 7:03pm PDT

Many corporate customers still do not grasp the key benefits of cloud computing, one top analyst says.

In a research note posted today, Gartner distinguished analyst John Pescatore said many corporate customers he’s talked to recently who are evaluating cloud computing for the first time are not interested in “true” cloud benefits — that is, the offloading of compute and storage to infrastructure as a service — but rather they are looking at the technology as a means to secure the virtual data center.

“A lot of those client calls are around dealing with the issues of business unit desire to use the cloud or IT wanting to use cloud, Pescatore wrote in his blog. “But when you dig a bit deeper, the current business issues (not the hype) are really about (in order of currency and importance):

1. Maintaining security when the data center goes virtual, both VMWare and SAN issues.

2. Being told “We are going to consume ‘X as a Service’ – go make sure it is secure.”

3. A narrower version of (2): “We are looking at Microsoft BPOS or Google Apps Premier Edition for email/office productivity as a service – is anyone like us doing that? If so, what about security?”

4. User desire to use consumer-grade services, like free online backup or other advertising support online offerings.

Pescatore wrote that questions about “true” cloud usage are tutorial in nature and that many clients have “no near term” plans to embrace IaaS.

Details on his finding will be released in a report later this month.

Can’t say I’m that surprised: a lot of IT pros who used mainframes or looked at mainframes didn’t get the benefits of automated workload management either.

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Topics

Paula Rooney is a Boston-based writer who has followed the tech industry for almost two decades.

Disclosure

Paula Rooney

Paula Rooney owns no stock in the companies that she covers. She holds a 401K that is managed by JPMorgan.

Biography

Paula Rooney

Paula Rooney has covered the technology industry for more than 15 years, starting with semiconductor design and mini-computer systems at EDN News and later focused on PC software companies including Microsoft, Lotus, Oracle, Red Hat, Novell and other open source and commercial software companies for CRN and PCWeek. She received a silver award from the American Society of Business Publication Editors in 2005 for her profile on Linus Torvalds and edited and co-authored "Partnering With Microsoft," a book about Microsoft's channel published by CMP Publishing in 2004. Rooney graduated from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1997. In her off time, she enjoys scuba diving, sailing, sun worshipping, running and reading. She resides on the shores of Scituate, Massachusetts.

Talkback Most Recent of 28 Talkback(s)

  • Maybe it's a simple explanation
    Maybe they just don't like it. SOA was a black hole that sucked money and never returned anything worth while. "Cloud" is just SOA with a different wrapper.

    Maybe they're all tired of being suckered by the buzz word of the month that doesn't provide any value.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Chad_z
    16th Aug 2010
  • When customers don't "get" something....
    there is something usually wrong with the product. It is very rare that a "all hands on deck" marketing campaign can turn a turd into a diamond, but the cloud guys just can't take no for an answer.

    This should be a clue to IT customers that cloud computing is simply a new way to bleed money to lowest cost providers that can be in other jurisdictions and can potentially hold your data hostage... or just go bankrupt and leave you holding an empty hard drive.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    croberts
    16th Aug 2010
  • They get it very well ... Garner doesn't
    They know that:
    - IT IS INSECURE. No matter how you look at it, the fact is that the cloud is insecure. Your data will be readily accessible by unknown, uncleared personnel in which ever cheap location around the world the vendor could find.
    - The cloud means your down time will go from minutes to hours and even days. A disruption in your internet connection will mean your entire business is down, not just the affected server, database or share drive. Meaning, looses will be in man-months, not just minutes.
    - Private cloud is nothing more than what they already have today. Why pay a premium for the same capabilities you already have??
    ZDNet Gravatar
    wackoae
    16th Aug 2010
  • I get cloud computing
    and I think it will fail. Companies are to concerned with security to allow the control of their systems to someone else.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    talamakara
    16th Aug 2010
  • RE: Gartner: customers still don't get cloud computing
    @talamakara

    I agree that security is an important issue, but that is what private clouds are for - offer scalability, agility, and elasticity in your own IT departments or datacenters; have resource pools and easily configurable VMs that can access them, and offer the IT department's infrastructure/development platform/services as a service internally.

    And you can't say that all the data/applications that a company uses require a high level of security - in some cases there's very little risk involved to having a certain service in the cloud.

    Companies just have to play smart and know what they can and can't put in the cloud. For the public cloud, these are growing pains rather than the sign of an early demise. For the private cloud management companies, this is an opportunity to allay the fears of security issues.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    rodutrad
    16th Aug 2010
  • RE: Gartner: customers still don't get cloud computing
    @rodutrad for internal how is that different from what we already have ????
    ZDNet Gravatar
    mrlinux
    17th Aug 2010
  • RE: Gartner: customers still don't get cloud computing
    "customers still don't get cloud computing"

    The first mistake? Blaming the customers.

    You don't run a good business by telling your customers what's best for them. You run a good business by having them tell you what they want, then doing your best to give them what they want.

    The truly good businesses are those that make their customers #1, above even their own preconceptions of what the "best" way to do things is or what they think the future is.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    CobraA1
    16th Aug 2010
  • RE: Gartner: customers still don't get cloud computing
    @Chad_z

    I don't think SOA and Cloud are quite the same thing, although some would argue that you can't have a cloud environment without a service-oriented architecture. SOA is more about dealing with problems inherent in the lack of interoperability with different systems in an IT department and making services loosely-coupled (black boxes with hidden implementation). The public cloud is an example of a service-oriented architecture in that it abstracts out the implementation of a certain service (how you procure and set up a server in the case of IaaS, the load-balancing and application hosting in PaaS, and the all of the above + data storage and updating in SaaS). In the case of a private cloud, offering your internal servers and virtual machines as a service and having oversight and governance over those VMs while the actual users have relatively simple provisioning experience is an example of a service-oriented architecture, but it is not the all-transforming, IT-wide SOA that has brought so many enterprises to their knees.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    rodutrad
    16th Aug 2010
  • None of you guys like the cloud
    but I assume that you all like virtualization. You kind of hamstring virtualization by stopping short of a cloud architecture. The "islands" (silos?) of compute power just move from single servers to virtualized - but still single servers.

    As I have wrote in the past, I see no advantage at all with carving up a single server into VMs. There IS a performance penalty (ever have to move a server OFF of a VM because the performance wasn't there? I see it all the time now). What was the point of creating W2k8 with all of its solid multitasking - when you want to run a single app on it? I've said this before - why not run DOS on the VMs, since you are only running 1 app at a time (said fallaciously). Either go with the cloud - or throw away virtualization.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Roger Ramjet
    17th Aug 2010
  • RE: Gartner: customers still don't get cloud computing
    @Roger Ramjet:

    It's simple - virtual machines sit in MY rack in MY office and write data to MY hard drives. Performance losses on the few VMs I have are negligible 'cuz those servers are low-use anyway. Cloud computing sit in SOMEONE ELSE's rack in SOMEONE ELSE's data center and write data to SOMEONE ELSE's hard drives. Call me a control freak if you want, but it's my ass on the line if something breaks. I can outsource the service, but management will still look at me funny if something happens and their data is missing/leaked/incompatible. Oh, and our internet pipe has gone down every so often, usually for just a few minutes, but you're welcome to answer my phone during that time when users can't access the web-based services we DO use.

    Joey
    ZDNet Gravatar
    voyager529
    17th Aug 2010
  • Then why do you virtualize?
    @voyager529 Do you have REAL needs for VMs or did you just drink the Kool Aide? BTW a local "private" cloud does count as cloud computing.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Roger Ramjet
    17th Aug 2010
  • RE: Gartner: customers still don't get cloud computing
    @voyager529 I also use VMs for low use machines. Why have physical hardware taking up space and power for 20 or so low use systems that can't be put on the same server when you can put them in a small vm cluster of say 2 or 3 servers and save the power/space/etc?
    ZDNet Gravatar
    bjs_z
    17th Aug 2010
  • Let me rephrase - Customers don't want cloud computing.
    Sorry but it's a step backward and customers just don't want or need it. Centralised computing was beaten to death when users were able to get pc's, no reason to go backward.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    NoAxToGrind
    17th Aug 2010
  • I actually do get it...
    I get cloud computing. That means I understand what it is and what it is not. I also understand many cloud vendors have their own interpretations.
    What I don't get is why cloud vendors don't listen to their customers and are trying to force platforms and services on me that are only half baked.
    1. I want security both in data storage and data transport. If a country wants access to my companies data they can bloody well issue a court order. They shouldn't have the right to snoop when ever they feel like it.
    2. I need off line tools for when my Internet connection goes down.
    3. I need an exit strategy for when a cloud vendor goes out of business, changes their business, or sells their business. Why should my business go down the toilet tubes just because some random cloud vendor gets bought, sold, or goes out of business?
    4. I need my cloud services to comply with my business practices and comply with the laws and regulations that my business has to obey.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    mr1972
    17th Aug 2010
  • #1 - Can't have it
    @mr1972 Do you understand encryption (as is used today)? Each side of a data transport has a private and public key (pair). These keys reside in clear text files on each side of the data transport. There are human sysadmins that have access to that clear text file - on both sides of the data transport.

    It all comes down to trust in other humans. Does that make you feel any better?
    ZDNet Gravatar
    Roger Ramjet
    17th Aug 2010

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