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By ZeroOutages.com In this document we will be discussing the trend toward cloud computing along with software as a service and how these new efficiency driven technologies are driving the need for Internet redundancy and reliability. What Is Cloud Computing? Cloud computing aka “Internet computing” is a method of computing in which resources are provided as a service to end-users who can access those resources from anywhere in the world where the Internet is available. It does not require that the end user have any knowledge or expertise in the underlying technology infrastructure that supports the service. What this essentially means is that businesses of all sizes can now take advantage of highly integrated and complex software systems, without having to own or maintain any of the infrastructure which enables these systems and keeps them running. Web 2.0 is a well-known technology trend and “cloud computing” takes full advantage of this new trend in order to deliver the satisfying experience for end-users and is one of the reasons why customers are adopting this technology. Advantages of Cloud Computing The primary driver for companies to deploy a SaaS solution is cost reduction and improved productivity. With SaaS businesses no longer have to spend capital to build a data center to hold there application servers, they no longer have to purchase expensive servers to run their application software, and they no longer have to paid up front for software packages. Beyond the infrastructure cost savings, there are additional cost savings in not having to hire and train personnel to install setup and maintain the application infrastructure. Combined these are significant cost savings which translates to more available capital which can be applied directly to developing the customer business instead of its basic operations. Additionally cost savings come from the fact that the business no longer has to worry about data backups, data center redundancy, and all of the other technology components which are generally required in order for a business to deploy a mission critical application as the software service provider handles all of these aspects how as part of the monthly SaaS fee. Finally additional productivity can be realized through the fact that, in general, most SaaS solutions include automated software upgrades and system improvements which enables SaaS customers to immediately take advantage of the latest and greatest efficiencies created by the new application updates. SaaS Examples: - SalesForce is a major leader in SaaS deployments and is starting to see a significant increase in new registrations by larger Fortune 500 companies. - Netsuite, Quickbooks Online, MAS Online and other accounting/CRN packages are now available to businesses of all sizes. - Microsoft has launched a number of service initiatives, including is Exchange Online, MS Dynamic CRM, and Live Meeting programs. - Google and others have launched new office-based applications over the Internet and while it is generally used by small business, the trend continues and more mid-to-large size companies are looking to deliver office applications from the cloud in order to reduce costs and improve productivity through faster application development cycles. - Hundreds of smaller startup software companies are looking to launch new applications only using the service model. As the trend continues it will become more likely that any new application will be released with both a service and a direct purchase option. Software as a service is growing and will become the dominate application delivery method within the next 5-10 years! How Does Cloud Computing Drive Redundancy? The greatest challenge for end-users that deploy cloud computing from an infrastructure point of view will be making sure that they always have access to the remote data centers which contain these services. While many larger offices would most likely use MPLS or other private line technology to access these data centers, that still leaves open to potential for an outage on that private link. Smaller offices may only use Internet-based connectivity to access these data centers and again will require the ability to failover in the event that their primary Internet connection fails. In both of these scenarios, some type of inexpensive, i.e. Internet broadband based, connectivity will be required to ensure 24/7 uptime for offices utilizing cloud computing to cut costs and improve productivity. ZeroOutages provides the perfect solution to the requirement for network redundancy for these cloud computing customers. With the ability to provide automated failover along with Best Path Routing, ZeroOutages will ensure that businesses deploying SaaS solutions remain up and running even in the event of a link outage. ZeroOutages can be deployed in both a MPLS / Internet backup scenario or a dual-Internet link scenario and thus provide an expensive solution to the redundancy that will be 100% REQUIRED for cloud computing deployments. Customer’s deploying SaaS simply need to obtain a secondary Internet link provisioned which provides at least the minimum level of throughput required for the application. Then by adding the ZeroOutages service these links will be monitored 24/7 with automated failover in the event of a network outage. Thus ensuring that the remote offices and end-users stay up and running. In addition, with the ZeroOutages service the remote offices Internet-based connectivity with is non-critical, can be routed over the secondary backup circuit, thus fully utilizing the secondary connection even when the primary link is operating under normal circumstances. This “offloading” of non-critical traffic improves responsiveness of critical applications by freeing additional bandwidth for those applications and redirecting latency inducing applications, like P2P, etc across the secondary / backup circuit. Summary Cloud computing is a growing trend within the IT industry and one that will only gain acceptance as more and more companies realize the significant cost savings and capital investment savings which can be realized. It is likely that as corporate data centers age, that more and more businesses will look to SaaS over making additional investments in data center infrastructure. An overlooked aspect of this new trend in cloud computing is redundancy at the edge and/or at the “remote office”. End-users must have reliability built-in to their infrastructure to ensure that they can take advantage of the cost savings created by SaaS solutions and without reliable connectivity many of these cost savings could be negated. Therefore it is critical that these “remote offices” deploy network redundancy solutions that ensure 24/7 uptime, and the ZeroOutages service was specifically designed to provide this capability. For more information, please visit http://www.zerooutages.com Click here to become an agent for ZeroOutages.com
or contact Daren French at ZeroOutages is a proud sponsor of Channel Partners, Las Vegas
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