Monday, November 28, 2011

Top 10 Cloud Predictions for 2012

The cloud computing market will face some bumps as it continues to grow, says Forrester Research analyst James Staten. In part, that is because greater reliance on cloud services will raise the risk of exposure to outages, for example.


But one of the subsidiary challenges for some parts of the enterprise and business computing ecosystem. In particular, cloud services might pose a direct challenge to channel partners who typically serve the smaller and mid-sized business segments. 

"The channel will face the music," says Staten. "Reselling isn’t good enough anymore."


"For years I and my analyst brethren have been telling the value-added reseller market that they need to move away from revenue dependence on the resell of goods and services," Staten says. "Many have listened and now garner more revenue from consulting and unique intellectual property.
Here's the fundamental problem, he argues: "the cloud doesn’t need you."


Cloud services are a direct-sell business and standardized, Internet-resident services don’t need local relationships to reach their customers. 


There’s nothing to install, customization is minimal and margins are thin and volume-based. 


For the channel to survive it must add value around cloud services. While cloud services are standardized, how each company uses them is not and that’s where all the opportunity lies. Top 10 Cloud Predictions for 2012

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