CIO Strategy – It is not cloud versus in-house, says Forrester

Cloud computing does not suit all companies or applications, but it should be a key part of any organisation’s outsourcing strategy, says Forrester Research.

Businesses are faced with a set of choices for providing services, and success means making the right choices, James Staten, principal analyst at Forrester, told Computer Weekly.

“This is not a black and white issue of in-house versus the cloud,” he will tell attendees of the co-located Forrester EMEA 2010 Security Forum and Infrastructure & Operations Forum in London on 11-12 March.

Right sourcing means choosing the most appropriate model to optimise operations for each company and each application according to regulatory and business demands, he said.

Cloud services may not necessarily be more cost or operationally efficient than providing the same service in-house or outsourcing to a traditional application hosting provider, said Staten. “Cloud-based services may in fact be more expensive if the business does not have good network access from all sites or operates under a complex set of regulations.”

more of the ComputerWeekly article from Warwick Ashford

Alex Carroll

Managing Member at Lifeline Data Centers

Alex, co-owner, is responsible for all real estate, construction and mission critical facilities: hardened buildings, power systems, cooling systems, fire suppression, and environmentals. Alex also manages relationships with the telecommunications providers and has an extensive background in IT infrastructure support, database administration and software design and development. Alex architected Lifeline’s proprietary GRCA system and is hands-on every day in the data center.