Ericsson cloud factories
What is cloud computing?
We have different evolving answers to this simple question. Here is a chronological list of the most popular cloud definitions as I see it.
The Cloud Computing discussion group definition
From 2009. There are two main driving forces for Cloud-Computing:
1. On demand computing i.e. the ability to get a resource when I need it in matters of minutes.
2. Pay-per use i.e. the ability to pay only for what I use.
The rest is implementation detail.
NIST cloud computing definition
NIST (The National Institute of Standards and Technology) cloud definition expanded over the years to two pages. This is most accurate, long, academic, monotonous definition of cloud computing. It is a good definition to teach students cloud computing 101 But it has no implicit business model. No one tells you how to make money as a reward for taking the troubles to transition to cloud
Amazon Web Services Cloud Computing Definition
From the AWS web page:
“Cloud Computing”, by definition, refers to the on-demand delivery of IT resources and applications via the Internet with pay-as-you-go pricing.
This is a much shorter definition applicable right away in practice It is a business model definition.
But what business model? AWS defines a business model for the maximum Amazon benefits. It says, I (Amazon) offer the infrastructure, to you (the customer) to run your apps. You pay me (AWS) for the usage. I set my pricing, it is up to you, Mr. Cloud Customer, to figure out how to make money.
Amazon cloud computing definition is practically the same with definition from 2009 Cloud Computing group. The great differentiator is that they actually tell you how to do this step by step, in the next paragraph after their definition
The dominant Cloud Computing perception is inspired from AWS success. The popular belief is that a cloud is what Amazon does.
A metaphor
One metaphor is that AWS cloud definition is like the parallel postulate of Euclid. A mathematician must be crazy to challenge something so obvious.
But this is exactly what happened to the mathematician Janos Bolyai
He became so obsessed with Euclid’s parallel postulate that his father wrote to him:
“For God’s sake, I beseech you, give it up. Fear it no less than sensual passions because it too may take all your time and deprive you of your health, peace of mind and happiness in life”.
János, however, persisted in his quest and eventually came to the conclusion that the postulate is independent of the other axioms of geometry and that different consistent geometries can be constructed on its negation.
He wrote to his father: “I created a new, different world out of nothing.” This world was the non-euclidean geometry.
Every new business model for cloud computing must have its own definition, based on facts no one noticed before. Imposing the Amazon cloud definition to everyone and everywhere, we “do violence to nature” and we show “conformity to a blindly formed chimera”
Ericsson Cloud Fundamentals
You can have a look at the new Ericsson White Paper Next Generation Data Centers Infrastructure
Ericsson press releases mention that over the past decade Web-based services like Google, Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft have stopped buying finished computers, storage devices and network components and instead developed their own systems in-house to create massive, low-cost datacenters in the cloud to serve billions of users.
The Google, Facebook and Amazon like companies are self-sufficient. They never buy infrastructure resources from each other. So why many Fortune 2000 companies can’t do the same?
CIO’s are thinking today how to begin to modernize the end-to-end IT infrastructure, so it can be a cloud factory.
This video below features Jason Hoffman, CTO Ericsson Cloud Computing. He explains the Ericsson Cloud Fundamentals responding to the real needs of companies that will preserve their DNA. The cloud shall not change who we really are:
Disclosure
I don’t say anything online that I wouldn’t say in person. I am now an evangelist on contract to the Ericsson Cloud Product Team. What I say are exclusively my thoughts, views, opinions or understanding of a topic or issue, and not my employer’s. I can be wrong even though I try hard not to be. I will admit to mistakes, correct them promptly and even apologize where it is appropriate.
