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Cloud Computing Case Study

Good Essays

1. Firms are increasingly turning to cloud computing as a means of managing their IT infrastructure. Notably, the industry is expected to expand 19% to $162 billion by 2020 (Columbus, 2017). This trend can be explained by the business benefits and solutions to problems cloud services including infrastructure, software programs, and platforms as services (IaaS, SaaS, and PaaS respectively) provide. Cloud networks eliminate a manager’s need to establish a private IT infrastructure and datacenter. Consequently, decision makers do not have to organize and implement an IT department (responsible for managing the firm’s IT infrastructure), as this responsibility is placed upon service providers such as Google Cloud Services. Furthermore, …show more content…

Over or under investment in IT infrastructure (i.e., space for a database, IT specialists) is also avoided, as managers must only pay for the amount of services used. Finally, problems relating to maintenance and upgrading are avoided since it is done automatically by the service provider.
2.
The two major disadvantages associated with cloud computing include cloud reliability, security, and runaway costs. Cloud security and reliability are tied together, and both are issues because of the fact that a firm’s IT infrastructure is managed by a third party; managers have little control and thus cannot ensure that private or sensitive company information is secure. Consequently, cloud outages such as a 2018 AWS outage, significantly impede a business to access its IT resources and carry out operations that incorporate these resources until the outage is clear. This issue is exacerbated by the growing digital transformation of business functions and a shift to using mobile platforms to conduct business processes (Edmead, 2016). More firms are using cloud services to stay connected using mobile or digital platforms, increasing their vulnerability to outages. Firms which use public cloud systems are also vulnerable to security breaches. Those who organize and carry out infiltrating cloud systems gain access to confidential corporate information that would

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