Right time for SMEs to cash in on cloud

BANGALORE, INDIA: In the year 1966, Douglas Parkhill in his book 'The Challenge of the Computer Utility' wrote that the Information Technology (IT) would become public utility, much like water, gas, electricity and telecommunication.

The concept of computing as public utility remained a concept for nearly 50 years. Now some models and forms of computing in a utility are emerging such as storage and server virtualization, grid computing, and cloud computing.

What interests among these is 'cloud computing'. In simple terms, Wikipedia says, cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility (like the electricity) over a network (Internet).

So how will cloud help SMEs? The scalability and 'pay as you use' services mean that SMEs can get the latest technology or software and pay as per the usage. This is especially important for start-ups and small companies which want to avoid buying large IT infrastructure that may be under-utilized. This also helps SMEs minimise their capital expenditure on the IT infrastructure and its maintenance there after.

The second important benefit of cloud is security and disaster recovery. Data stored in a cloud cannot be stolen. It also provides complete control over its maintenance. Above all, cloud computing allows SMEs to focus on their core business and avoid having huge IT team of running and maintaining IT infrastructure.

Cloud to create market access for SMEs: Mittal 

In a media interview, Uday Kumar Verma, secretary for the ministry of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) ministry, has said that the government is considering subsidy to SMEs for using modern IT tools like cloud computing. The Ministry is looking at SME associations to help in its initiative to implement this scheme. This sure is a game changer.

It is clear that more and more companies will see the adoption of various forms of cloud computing in the near future. It's time SMEs too take this advantage.