News Desk

That Boom You Hear Is the Cloud

Mon, 21 May 2012 17:00:00 EDT

Cloud computing is creating the new Wall Street boom, according to NIA. The only industry that is as bright as cloud computing on Wall Street is social networking, NIA said in a recent report. 2012 will be known as the year cloud computing became widely adopted worldwide. Cloud computing is expected to create 14 million new jobs globally by 2015. In the consumer space, Gartner predicts cloud services will be on 90 percent of personal consumer devices by 2015 so consumers can store, connect, stream and synchronize content across multiple platforms at different locations. That's a lot of tunes and apps. So far this year, there have been three IPOs of cloud computing stocks, and all three IPOs have been major successes, indicating cloud computing is ready for primetime on Wall Street. And where the money goes, jobs follow.

Cloud Expo New York: Building a Private, Public, or Hybrid Cloud?

Mon, 21 May 2012 16:30:00 EDT

Whatever your course, meet Cloud complexity head on with a unified approach to handle extreme performance, reliability, availability, and simplicity. In her session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Ayalla Goldschmidt, Senior Director of Product Marketing at Oracle, will reveal the underpinnings for the Oracle Public Cloud as well as technology best-practices for developing private and hybrid cloud architectures using Oracle’s Engineered Systems together with Oracle Fusion Middleware. Oracle Fusion Middleware is a complete array of technologies enabling you to embrace the paradigm shift of cloud computing and take full advantage of the cost savings and improved agility they promise. Together with Oracle Exalogic and Oracle Exadata provide the world’s first and only integrated engineered system, which provide enterprises the best possible foundation for running enterprise applications with the performance, elasticity, reliability, and scale characteristics expected for cloud-based applications.

Appcore Coupon Code ▸appcoreVIPgold Special Offer as Cloud Expo Sponsor

Mon, 21 May 2012 15:27:00 EDT

As a Bronze Sponsor of Cloud Expo New York, Appcore is offering special passes to SYS-CON's 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. Appcore manufactures the business of cloud computing. Appcore delivers Infrastructure-as-a-Service technology to telcos, data centers, fiber rings, and enterprises to enable Public (service provider) and Private (enterprise) cloud environments. Appcore's flagship product, Appcore Onsite, is a certified, integrated stack of hardware and software systems designed to be data center roll-in ready, accelerating the deployment of cloud environments.

Cloud Expo New York: Accelerate Enterprise Cloud Deployment

Mon, 21 May 2012 11:30:00 EDT

According to a 2011 survey by the Independent Oracle User Group, over 50% of Oracle’s customers have deployed or are considering deploying private clouds. Most private clouds today support non-production workloads because enterprises are unable to deploy mission-critical applications in their private cloud. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Anand Akela, Sr. Principal Product Director at Oracle, will discuss how the same Oracle technology that powers the Oracle Public Cloud enables you to deploy mission-critical applications in your cloud.

Cloud Expo NY: How Pro Sports Teams Use Collaborative Decision Making

Mon, 21 May 2012 11:28:00 EDT

The impact of Big Data is extremely broad for business, information management and technology. Being able to analyze your growing mountain of data can give you a distinct competitive advantage, but Big Data can be more than traditional tools can handle. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, John Igoe, Executive Director of Cloud and Big Data Solutions at Dell, will discuss how Dell Apache Hadoop Solutions can help by providing super-fast analysis, data mining and processing.

Facebook Crashes at Open

Mon, 21 May 2012 10:42:00 EDT

Facebook opened below its $38 IPO Monday morning and kept on tanking, losing 10% within 10 minutes. It put up a defense at around $33, down around 13%, and moved to around $34, down around 11%, within 45 minutes but didn’t hold that bottom and was back below $33 when last seen. Some people paid as much as $45 a share on Friday when it closed at $38.23. The $45 price mirrors what Facebook was fetching on the secondary markets a few weeks ago before those trades were halted. Take your pick for its shabby showing: Nasdaq’s serious software problems Friday; the jacked-up IPO price; the inflated size of the float; the announcement during its road show that its revenues were dropping; GM saying it wasn’t going to advertise on the site anymore. The list goes on and on.

Cloud Expo NY: Integrate Big Data & Cloud with Your On-Premise Data Center

Mon, 21 May 2012 10:24:00 EDT

Whether your company is large or small, you are probably exploring Big Data solutions and using cloud services and will need to integrate with other enterprise workloads. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Gwyn Clay, CEO of Stonebranch, will share detailed information about how their customers are already integrating Workload Automation with tools like Hadoop, and running workloads completely in the cloud using a modern enterprise-wide workload automation solution that is 100% web-based, has modern graphical dashboards, embedded workload lifecycle management, and detailed auditing for security compliance.

Cloud Expo New York: Industry-Leading CxOs to Present June 11-14

Mon, 21 May 2012 10:00:00 EDT

What do the CTOs of the CIA and the U.S. Dept. of Justice and the CIO of the National Reconnaissance Office have in common with the CEOs of Eucalyptus, GoGrid, ActiveState, Appcara, OpSource and Nortonworks, the CTOs of Rackspace, SoftLayer, SOA Software and AppZero, the Founder & General Manager of Dell Boomi, the VP of Big Data & Streams at IBM and the Chief Strategy Officer at Pacific Controls? Answer: all are shortly to present breakout sessions as members of the distinguished Speaker Faculty of Cloud Expo New York, taking place June 11-14, 2012, at the Jacob Javits Convention Center in New York City.

Cloud Expo Sponsor Rackspace Special Offer Coupon Code ▸ rackspaceVIPgold

Mon, 21 May 2012 09:49:00 EDT

As a Platinum Plus Sponsor of Cloud Expo New York, Rackspace Hosting is offering special passes to SYS-CON's 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. Rackspace Hosting is the service leader in cloud computing, and a founder of OpenStack, an open source cloud operating system. The San Antonio-based company provides Fanatical Support® to its customers and partners, across a portfolio of IT services, including Managed Hosting and Cloud Computing. Rackspace has been recognized by Bloomberg BusinessWeek as a Top 100 Performing Technology Company and was featured on Fortune’s list of 100 Best Companies to Work For. The company was also positioned in the Leaders Quadrant by Gartner Inc. in the “2010 Magic Quadrant for Cloud Infrastructure as a Service and Web Hosting.”

Dependencies Gone Wild: Testing Cloud Apps at Cloud Expo New York

Mon, 21 May 2012 09:45:00 EDT

The move to cloud-based applications has undeniably delivered tremendous benefits. However, the associated distribution creates various challenges from the quality perspective: End-to-end tests need to pass through multiple dependent systems, which are commonly unavailable, evolving, or difficult-to-access for testing. Accessing such systems often involves transaction and bandwidth fees. Teams need to test and tune the system under test against a realistic and broad range of performance and behavior conditions – yet such conditions are often difficult to achieve in a test environment.

What's Working, What's New, What's Next? | CTO Power Panel at Cloud Expo

Mon, 21 May 2012 09:15:00 EDT

In this CTO Power Panel at the 10th International Cloud Expo, moderated by Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan, industry-leading CTOs & VPs of Technology will discuss such topics as: Which do you think is the most important cloud computing standard still to tackle? Who should and shouldn’t be using a PaaS product today, and why? Can a public cloud ever be truly secure? How important is open source to cloud computing and Big Data? "Mission-critical apps are now safe in the cloud." True or false? In your company how important a component is mobility in your cloud thinking? If we now have "elastic IT" does that mean you view yourself as an "elastic CTO"???

Cloud Expo New York: How to Build a Secure Cloud Service

Mon, 21 May 2012 09:00:00 EDT

For many of the same reasons that Software-as-a-Service is catching on with enterprise buyers, delivering web services on top of Infrastructure-as-a-Service architectures is appealing to the SaaS developers. Operational agility, lower CapEx, and a broad array of tools and services are on tap that make both public and private IaaS clouds a great platform to build on. But how do you do this securely, especially in the public cloud where you have no access to the network or hypervisor your servers are running in? Furthermore, for many SaaS providers, the person charged with security considerations isn’t a CSO or IT specialist, but rather, a “DevOps” guru – someone with their hands in both development and operations. While the traditional security professional is focused on compliance and security rules, this new crop is more concerned with continuous development and high availability.

Cloud & Big Data Strategy | CEO Power Panel at Cloud Expo New York

Mon, 21 May 2012 08:30:00 EDT

In this CEO Power Panel at the 10th International Cloud Expo, moderated by Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan, leading executives in the Cloud Computing and Big Data space will be discussing such topics as: Is it just wishful thinking to depict the Cloud as more than just a technology solution? If not, then what concrete examples best demonstrate cloud computing as an engine of business value? Big Data has existed since the early days of computing; why, then, do you think there is such an industry buzz around it right now? Do you agree that cloud computing is basically to technology what credit is in the financial services industry, i.e., it enables companies to leverage capabilities that they don’t own. Or are there better analogies?

China Gives Google-Motorola Merger Conditional OK

Mon, 21 May 2012 08:15:00 EDT

China’s antitrust regulators gave Google’s $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility the nod Saturday provided Google’s Android operating system remains open and free-of-charge for the next five years. The “free” stipulation apparently doesn’t apply to applications or services, but it remains to be seen how that works out. Google will have to report about its compliance with the terms to a Chinese monitor. “At the end of the five years, the Ministry of Commerce will continue to assess the state of the Chinese smartphone operating system market,” the agency said on its web site. Google’s relationship with China has been tense since it moved its Chinese search operation to Hong Kong complaining of censorship. There’s also the little matter of China reportedly hacking its computers and stealing its secrets. China was the last approval the giant deal needed so it might close this week. It will make Google a maker of phones, tablets and other devices like set-top boxes. MMI, needless to say, makes Android devices, raising issues about what Android terms will be for other manufacturers. It has also courted patent infringement suits from Apple and Microsoft and an investigation by the European Commission into its licensing terms for FRAND patents. In a statement, the Chinese ministry aligned behind Motorola’s FRAND obligations. How China might interpret FRAND is unclear. Google will now own MMI’s 17,000 patents and 7,500 patent applications, but has already backed Motorola’s unreasonably high prices. Ironically China wants Google not to discriminate on Android. Chinese phone makers ZTE and Huawei use Android and have to compete against foreign handset makers that also use Android. The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Google would abandon its practice of giving early access to new Android code to only one company.

Cloud Expo New York: Private PaaS for the Enterprise and Beyond

Mon, 21 May 2012 08:00:00 EDT

If your organization already uses virtualized infrastructure, you are well on your way to providing IT as a Service. But as businesses demand faster results in today’s competitive market, organizations look to gain more benefits from cloud computing than just virtualized infrastructure. Learn how to extend & ensure your private cloud investment with a private Platform as a Service (PaaS) and provide on-demand availability, flexibility, control, and ultimately, faster time-to-market for your development teams. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Bart Copeland, President & CEO of ActiveState Software, will discuss how Private PaaS technology gives you control over where, when and how you leverage the cloud.

Nasdaq CEO Embarrassed by Facebook IPO Glitches

Mon, 21 May 2012 08:00:00 EDT

In the wake of the Facebook IPO fiasco, Nasdaq CEO Robert Greifeld beat his breast and told the Wall Street Journal along with other press Sunday that Nasdaq’s “acknowledged design problems” bungled the social network’s landmark lPO Friday. Reporters were told on a conference call that problems with order cancellations interfered with Facebook’s debut despite trial runs that didn’t detect any problems with handling what was expected to be massive demand. The Nasdaq even considered halting trading so it could sort out its Friday’s foul-ups but didn’t. “This was not our finest hour,” Greifeld reportedly said. The Nasdaq, he said, which fought to keep the IPO away from the New York Stock Exchange, is “humbly embarrassed.” Nasdaq’s board met Saturday to consider what happened Friday when the sexy Facebook offering closed at $38.23, a mere 23 cents better than its IPO price, down from an open of $42.05 and a momentary high of $45. There are now supposed to be changes. The IPO suffered a half-hour delay – although that’s not unusual – and then had technical glitches that upset traders and created confusion. Mutual funds and other institutions had to wait more than two hours after the stock opened at 11:30am New York time to find out whether their orders had been honored or canceled and at what price, a situation that reportedly caused big investors to bail out. Some of these orders were placed at 7:30am. It was said Friday that the stock actually had to be propped up. Fox News claims it heard that the Nasdaq may have to make good the $100 million in losses investors and traders say they suffered Friday because the exchange “essentially broke down and failed to execute buy and sell orders” for the stock at various times during the day. Other people Fox talked to, who apparently expect Greifeld to be a “gentleman” and make them whole, say the number could go to $200 million. Any legal obligations are unclear. Reputation risks are another thing. Needless to say Facebook is upset while the Big Board feels vindicated. The New York Times says Greifeld isn’t buying into responsibility for Facebook’s “lackluster performance.” It was the fault of the “number of order cancellations that came in during the final stages of the initial public offering process” and “backed up Nasdaq’s systems” until two or, in some cases, after 2:30 in the afternoon. “Nothing in Nasdaq’s data indicated that the exchange’s technical issues had any effect on Facebook’s shares,” the Times said. Something like 310 million shares reportedly traded in one 90-minute period. Meanwhile, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg got married to his girlfriend Priscilla Chen Saturday in a backyard wedding that came as a surprise to the guests who thought they were at Zuckerberg’s house in Palo Alto to celebrate Chen’s graduation from med school according to the AP. No word on any prenup. They have been together since meeting at Harvard nine or 10 years ago.

Citrix Buys Virtual Computer

Mon, 21 May 2012 08:00:00 EDT

Citrix has acquired Virtual Computer, a little Massachusetts outfit with enterprise-scale management solutions for client-side virtualization. It means to combine the acquisition’s NxTop widgetry with its XenClient hypervisor to create a new Citrix XenClient Enterprise edition that can manage “large fleets” of corporate laptops across a distributed enterprise and give users a virtual desktop “to go.” It’s due this quarter as a standalone product at a reported $175 a user. Citrix said it’s getting the management piece faster by buying it. Virtual Computer has historically focused on solutions for Xen-based client hypervisors. Its technology includes backup, disaster recovery, provisioning, security and monitoring capabilities. The merger also promises greater integration between XenClient and XenDesktop.

Best Buy Chairman to Step Down After Probe

Mon, 21 May 2012 08:00:00 EDT

Best Buy founder and its largest shareholder Richard Schulze, 71, will be stepping down as chairman June 21 after a board investigation found he didn’t disclose CEO Brian Dunn’s “extremely close personal relationship” with a 29-year-old female employee to the board’s audit committee. Instead, based on an informant’s written testimony and ignoring possible liabilities to the company, he confronted Dunn who denied it. Dunn and the woman maintained to investigators that their relationship wasn’t “romantic or otherwise improper” – although he called her 33 times, sent 149 text messages and 42 pictures or video messages during two trips abroad last year and she wasn’t discrete among co-workers about favors he did for her like soliciting a vendor for a ticket to a concert in Vegas and helping her pay for the trip.

Cloud Expo New York Now Just Three Weeks Out!

Mon, 21 May 2012 07:45:00 EDT

The only place to be June 11-14th is the NY Javits Center at Cloud Expo 2012 East. Join us there as delegates from all over the world come to listen to and engage with speakers and sponsors from the leading Cloud Computing, Big Data and Virtualization companies such as Dell, SHI, Intel, Compuware, Citrix, Rackspace, Terremark, Akamai and more. The event features 100+ Technical Sessions, General Sessions, Industry Discussion Panels, and Keynotes by thought leaders in the Cloud, Big Data and Virtualization space. There is no better way to get in front of the market that IDC is predicting will represent 25% of all IT spending growth worldwide through 2012. Cloud Expo 2012 East is an invaluable resource for meeting with today’s top industry buyers, making new contracts and, most importantly, closing business deals.

Study: Cloud Computing Cuts $5.5 Billion Annually from Federal Budget

Mon, 21 May 2012 07:15:00 EDT

The federal government saved nearly $5.5 billion a year by moving to cloud services. But it might have saved up to $12 billion if cloud strategies were more aggressive, a survey of federal IT managers found. The study, drawn from interviews with 108 federal CIOs and IT managers, was published by MeriTalk Cloud Computing Exchange, a community of federal government leaders focused on public-private collaboration in Washington, D.C. The IT managers surveyed also reported spending 11 percent of their current, fiscal year 2013 budgets, or $8.7 billion, on cloud computing. The chief impediment to implementing cloud services was security, listed by 85 percent of federal IT managers. Also of concern were agency culture, named by 38 percent of managers, and service levels, listed by 32 percent of managers.

Nvidia Claims Cloud GPU

Mon, 21 May 2012 07:15:00 EDT

Nvidia Tuesday unveiled a VGX platform – reportedly the result of five years of effort – that it called the world’s first virtualized GPU meant to accelerate graphics from cloud computing centers. IT departments are supposed to use it to deliver virtualized desktops with the graphics and GPU performance of office PCs or workstations to employees using any connected and BYOD devices regardless of operating system including thin clients, laptops, tablets and smartphones. The dingus, an enterprise implementation of the company’s new Kepler GPU, is also supposed to work with 3D design and simulation tools previously deemed too intensive for virtualized desktops. Nvidia claims the platform “delivers an experience nearly indistinguishable from a full desktop while substantially lowering the cost of a virtualized PC.”

Threatened, BMC Adopts Poison Pill

Mon, 21 May 2012 07:00:00 EDT

BMC Software Monday adopted a defensive poison pill to ward off Elliott Associates and its sister firm Elliott International, which have acquired 5.5% of its stock and want BMC to form a special committee to chase a sale of the company. Elliott, you will remember, is the activist hedge fund that pushed Novell into the arms of Attachmate. BMC said Elliott’s proposal is not in the best interests of other shareholders. In a letter to the board Tuesday, Elliott Management said BMC’s future will be increasingly difficult as a standalone public company; it’s suffering from sluggish growth, underperformance on its business plan and substantial execution challenges – it’s changed its sales chief four times since 2010; it’s been written off as a “growth-impaired legacy asset” with a low stock price; it lacks revenue-scale compared to its major competitors, IBM, HP and even CA; it’s late to SaaS and the cloud; and it’s facing new rivals eager to carve up its territory

SilkRoad Rakes in More Funding Ahead of IPO

Mon, 21 May 2012 06:00:00 EDT

SilkRoad Technology, the aptly named competitor of, say, the up-and-coming Workday that peddles cloud-based social talent management solutions, has topped up its funding with another reportedly oversubscribed $35 million round. That makes an incredible $162 million since 2003. The latest money comes from new investors Keating Capital and NTT Finance along with existing investors Intel Capital, Crosslink Capital, Foundation Capital, Azure Capital and Tenaya Capital, among others. It’s supposed to support worldwide expansion and product innovation ahead of a potential IPO this year or next.

Google Moves to Get Around ‘Google’s Pet’ Issue

Sun, 20 May 2012 16:00:00 EDT

Google has reportedly figured out a way to sort of avoid looking like it’s playing favorites if the Chinese ever decide to let it take over Motorola Mobility. With Jelly Bean, the next version of Android, the Wall Street Journal says it’s changed its strategy. Rather than work with just one Android pet on so-called “lead devices” before releasing the software to other OEMs, it’s going to work with as many as five vendors that will get early access to the code and also get to send their developers to the Googleplex to work shoulder-to-shoulder with Google and Google’s other pets.

Leveraging the Cloud for Better User Experience at Cloud Expo New York

Sun, 20 May 2012 05:45:00 EDT

The cloud has many benefits, but when it comes to application development, how does the cloud help enterprises and development teams create custom software and applications that end users actually care about? Using real world examples from Adobe, Herff Jones and Navy Federal Credit Union, this session will highlight the advantages cloud computing provides for quickly developing custom software and applications with compelling user experiences. In their general session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Anthony Franco, president of EffectiveUI, and Ken Guiberson, CTO of EffectiveUI, will explore: Using the flexible nature of cloud computing to rapidly design and deploy integrated enterprise applications Leveraging the cloud for a highly visible and transparent development process Using a service-oriented architecture (SOA) to create a hybrid cloud

Cloud Expo NY: Predictive Analytics Leads to Successful Recommendations

Sat, 19 May 2012 16:00:00 EDT

Businesses today generate billions of events or 100s of TBs of data in a month. These data contain valuable insights into customer behavior, key trends, buying patterns, etc. If these are successfully mined, they can lead to successful decision-making to maximize revenue and traffic for the business. Successfully driving a business is only partly about understanding what happened; the other part lies in knowing what’s going to happen next. In order to use past data and predict future events, there needs to be sufficient technology that is not merely extrapolating events. Powerful machine learning algorithms in association with combinatorial and graph algorithms are imperative to make accurate predictions about future events based on cross-dimensional correlations within the data, time-event correlations and recognizing patterns that would not be identified or understood using standard statistical, AI or Bayesian techniques. Handling the scale and the complex relationships within the data requires purpose-built algorithms that are specially designed to handle the needs of online businesses.

Cloud Expo New York: A Blueprint for Organizational Agility

Sat, 19 May 2012 14:00:00 EDT

We are a part of a dynamically connected world where consumers are rapidly adopting new technology and dismantling business models in their wake. Disruption, unpredictability and variability happen without warning. The challenge for any organization is to evolve, to adopt new architectures and processes that increase business agility, scalability and governance/compliance and decrease risk. While cloud is complex, the consideration and adoption process can be simplified. In his general session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Kevin Hanes, Executive Director, Dell Service & Solutions, will talk about a pragmatic approach to realizing the potential of cloud today while building a strong foundation for the future.

Facebook Closes Up 23 Cents

Fri, 18 May 2012 16:24:00 EDT

Facebook closed up a mere 23 cents its first day of trading as a public company after 421 million shares were sold to investors. The stock, which had jaundiced New Yorkers congregating in Times Square to see what would happen, opened a half-hour late Friday at around 11:30am at $42.05, up around 11%, hovered there briefly and then proceeded to drop back to its $38 IPO price within 20 minutes. It then started to get a little support and, without going negative (yet), at noontime in New York the stock was trading at $39 and change. Its execution leaves Linux Systems’ phenomenal record IPO rise untouched.

HTC Phones Cool Their Heels in US Customs Due to Ban

Fri, 18 May 2012 11:30:00 EDT

Shipments of two new HTC smartphones have been seized for inspection by US Customs because of the limited import ban Apple got from the International Trade Commission in mid-December. HTC was found to have infringed an Apple patent on “data tapping.” That’s when you, say, tap on a phone number and the dingus dials it for you. The Taiwan company wouldn’t be in this predicament if it had followed through on its initial decision to just rip the functionality out. Instead it ultimately decided on a workaround and the customs people are checking to see if it’s abiding by the rules. That means that the HTC One X that AT&T just started selling out of shipments that beat the ban’s April 19 enforcement date is now listed as “out of stock” and the HTC Evo 4G LTE that Sprint was to start selling this Friday has been put on hold. Sprint is taking pre-orders.

SHI Coupon Code ▸ shiVIPgold Special Offer as Cloud Expo Sponsor

Fri, 18 May 2012 10:29:00 EDT

As the Diamond Sponsor of Cloud Expo New York, SHI International is offering special passes to SYS-CON's 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. Founded in 1989, SHI International Corp. is a global provider of technology products and services. Driven by the industry's most experienced and stable sales force and backed by software volume licensing experts, hardware procurement specialists, and certified IT service professionals, SHI delivers custom IT solutions to Corporate, Enterprise, Public Sector, and Academic customers. With over 1,800 + employees worldwide, SHI is the largest Minority/Woman Owned Business Enterprise (MWBE) in the U.S. and is ranked 19th among Everything Channel's VAR 500 list of North American IT solution providers.

The Most Immediate Way of Getting to the Cloud: Cloud Expo New York

Fri, 18 May 2012 10:00:00 EDT

Whether you are a large enterprise, a growing business, a government organization, or a service provider, Cloud Expo New York is THE place you need to be June 11-14...so you can better understand both the provision and use of the cloud services that increasingly transforming IT and business alike. Cloud Expo covers every aspect of Cloud Computing: performance, integration, security, availability, compliance, purchasing, budgeting, development, visibility, automation...the works!

Defining Hybrid Cloud at Cloud Expo New York

Fri, 18 May 2012 09:45:00 EDT

Hybrid is an end state for most customers as it balances choice and the needs of the business against cost, flexibility and risk. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Mark Clifton, Director Cloud Solutions at Dell Commercial Business Unit, will discuss Hybrid cloud adoption as well as the issues around data portability, integration and security that need to be proactively addressed.

Data Center Fabric for Cloud Computing at Cloud Expo New York

Fri, 18 May 2012 08:00:00 EDT

Enterprise IT organizations want to deploy a virtualized data center fabric that will provide the foundation for agile private cloud computing. Getting there does not have to be difficult, but it does require a new approach to data center infrastructure design – an approach that is non-disruptive, vendor-agnostic, and very adaptable to changing business requirements. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Bruce Fingles, Chief Information Officer and VP of Product Quality at Xsigo, will look at the limitations of traditional thinking, and show how extending the power of virtualization can help maximize performance, minimize complexity, and empower IT organizations with an agile data center fabric.

Running Big Data Applications on Eucalyptus IaaS Cloud at Cloud Expo NY

Fri, 18 May 2012 08:00:00 EDT

Infrastructure as a Service cloud platforms enable enterprise to experience agility. Infrastructure agility is key to deploying Big Data platforms and applications. As datasets grow in size and numbers in the enterprise, there needs to be a place to store, secure and analyze the datasets. IaaS clouds like Eucalyptus, with the industry's de facto standard IaaS API implementation, can be “the place” to enable enterprises to deploy Big Data analytics and applications. Because all data is now in a centralized secure system, it becomes easier to enforce precise and well-documented security policies on sensitive data. The combination of flexibility, rapid automation, speed with which you can dynamically programmatically control infrastructure using Eucalyptus IaaS API, enable enterprises to develop, test and deploy new Big Data applications at a fraction of the cost that's never been possible before.

Facebook IPO Likely at $38 a Share: WSJ

Thu, 17 May 2012 16:10:00 EDT

Facebook decision makers and their bankers were reportedly closeted together shortly before the markets closed in New York Thursday trying to decide whether to price Facebook’s IPO at $38 or $39 a share, according to the Wall Street Journal, which evidently had a glass – in the way of a source – pressed to the conference room door. Although nothing is definite yet, evidently the $39 price might break the camel’s back. They reportedly tried it on investors and got told no. At $38 Facebook would be valued at a record $104 billion for an IPO and raise $18.4 billion. It would take $41 a share for the social networking site to best Visa’s record-setting IPO in 2008. Of course Visa had a proven business model. Facebook doesn’t.

HP Will Reportedly Lay Off 10%-15% of Workforce

Thu, 17 May 2012 14:53:00 EDT

An HP source told Business Insider that HP is going to make “massive” job cuts of 10%-15% of its workforce of 324,600 people. Bloomberg then picked up the tambourine and said the number is more like 8%, or 25,000 people. Factoring in attrition, early retirement and shifting jobs offshore, Business Insider reckons “HP’s total workforce numbers won’t reflect all of the cuts.” It thinks “we might also hear that HP is not going to rip the bandage off in one fell swoop, but will do one modest layoff in 2012, shift more work to offshore workers, and trim the workforce more over time.” It’s expecting to hear that HP Services is having “another abysmal quarter” and that “HP’s outsourcing units could be particularly hit hard with whatever layoffs come and many of their jobs moved offshore. We’re hearing that people with eight-10 years of experience – or are at the top of the salary charts – are the most vulnerable.”

Cloud Expo New York: How Secure Are You?

Thu, 17 May 2012 11:45:00 EDT

Nearly every enterprise is evaluating cloud computing solutions either today or in the near term. Many have already made the leap, and many more are getting close to putting that first toe in the water. But there are key considerations that should be made, questions to be asked, and designs to consider before you can feel secure with your provider. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, David Gulick, Product Manager, Hosting Product Management at Savvis, will help give you food for thought when having these conversations both internally and externally with service providers.

Cloud Computing Growing on the Businesses Priority Front

Thu, 17 May 2012 11:30:00 EDT

A survey of small and mid-size businesses found an interest in harnessing technology to improve business efficiency. Midsize businesses are turning to IT investments to grow their businesses and the larger the organization, the more likely it is to cite technology as having the greatest potential to increase productivity, according to a new survey of midmarket companies by Deloitte. The study shows cloud computing emerging as an investment priority. When asked what types of investments companies were likely to make in technology, 40 of the respondents cited cloud computing. That's close to automation of business processes (46 percent) and data analytics (41 percent), according to eWEEK. "Interestingly, there seems to be a greater recognition of the benefits of cloud computing," the report stated. "In our September 2011 survey, it was recognized as a distant fourth as a means to increase productivity. In this survey, it nearly equaled data analytics and business intelligence in terms of likely investments."

Supermicro to Exhibit at Cloud Expo 2012 New York

Thu, 17 May 2012 11:15:00 EDT

SYS-CON Events announced today that Super Micro Computer, Inc., a global leader in high-performance, high-efficiency server technology and green computing, will exhibit at SYS-CON's 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. Supermicro (NASDAQ: SMCI), the leading innovator in high-performance, high-efficiency server technology, is a premier provider of advanced server Building Block Solutions for Embedded Systems, Enterprise IT, Data Center, HPC, and Cloud Computing worldwide. Supermicro is committed to protecting the environment through its "We Keep IT Green" initiative and provides customers with the most energy-efficient, environmentally friendly solutions available on the market.

Mule ION iPaaS Connects Cloud to On-Premise Apps

Thu, 17 May 2012 11:00:00 EDT

New tools and services for swift software-as-a-service integration in the cloud lowers the barrier to SaaS adoption for SaaS providers and developers. MuleSoft this week launched Mule iON SaaS Edition, providing a broad set of new tools and services for swift software-as-a-Service (SaaS) integration in the cloud, and lowering the barrier to SaaS adoption for SaaS providers and developers. In recent commentary, Ross Mason, founder and CTO of Mulesoft, said, "The world today is moving at lightning speed to SaaS and cloud applications, and the idea of gaining competitive advantage through legacy enterprise applications is no longer relevant."