Interview with Microsoft’s Chou Emphasizes Importance of IaaS on the Cloud
I think it’s very valuable (and sometimes enjoyable) to read what top technology executives think about the future of the cloud. It not only gives you an idea of where their companies are going, in terms of their own development, but you sometimes get a good overview – and you pick up some surprises – of where the whole industry is headed.
That’s why I so enjoyed reading a recent article that interviewed Microsoft Architect David Chou. He believes that Infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) is the area of cloud computing that will make the most noticeable impact in 2010 – especially for startups and small to medium-sized businesses.
In the story, Chou says product planners, marketing, business executives and other non-IT people in businesses are the biggest category of people who are currently not using the cloud – but who should be. He said: “IT people tend to look at the cloud as an infrastructure option, but we think the cloud is an enabling technology for new business offerings and capabilities.”
Asked how important SOA was to the cloud – and vice-versa – Chou said: “Absolutely important!” Chou stressed that SOA was even more crucial on the cloud than traditional SOA patterns of enterprise-wide “transformational efforts” (big SOA). He thinks that, for the cloud, it’s more important to integrate with private clouds, other cloud services and applications, breaching individual cloud vendor boundaries and enterprise firewalls. And so SOA is essential in spanning all types of distributed services.
Also, interesting to note: In the piece, one of the top five cloud computing companies Chou names is Microsoft. Gee, what a surprise! The others he mentions, by the way, are: Amazon, Google, Salesforce and VMWare. He thinks the landscape will change quickly, though, as IBM, Oracle, and SAP “solidify/clarify” their plans.
Chou points to the East (China), too, and mentions some possible rising stars: companies like Baidu and Tencent/QQ.
Nice to get somewhat of a big picture view, and also very cool to read about Microsoft’s view of the cloud as an IaaS tool. And, if the non-IT audience that Chou mentions migrates more to the cloud, I’m predicting that their companies will step up monitoring efforts to ensure things run smoothly.
