“By end 2013, businesses leveraging on the cloud will create immense value”

Senior corporate executive adept in delivering information technology services, information security to business with hands on experience in delivering large and complex projects. LS Subramanian, cloud evangelist & senior advisor, Power Exchange of India and founder director, Cloud Security Alliance, Mumbai Chapter shares his views with Dataquest on the cloud scenario. Excerpts...

What is expected to hog headlines in the cloud computing space?

Cloud computing adoption will accelerate in 2013 as more corporates will use cloud for business agility and to lower cost of operations. The fear and distrust of cloud will continue among the Information Technology community and the drivers of cloud adoption will be the business who will seek the clouds benefits of agility and time to market for the business.

Cloud will continue to add value to business by integration of mobility and cloud for business collaboration and the use of Big Data for Business Analytics also Growth in Public cloud will be significant, followed by hybrid and private clouds.

• Tighter and secure integration between mobility and cloud will be the key driver for 2013 whether its transactional data, data archival or business data analytics
• Significant data will be stored in the cloud and better analytical tools for big data analytics will be available in the market for trawling into big data for insight into business opportunities
• Many IT service companies will transform themselves into Data analytics companies to benefit from the opportunities of working on Big Data
• Security in the cloud will see phenomenal growth both is sales of cloud based security tools and also cloud risk assurance
• The trends and opportunities will be exponential growth in cloud competing; the numbers forecasted by the pundits indicate a forecast will be a 30% growth in cloud computing business as compared to 2012.

 

How would you describe the status of cloud w.r.t skillsets?

I have been stating that Indian IT companies that do not adopt cloud computing practice aggressively are doomed to perish. Those companies who have a clear road map and a strong belief in cloud computing are already creating cloud jobs and attracting the right talent.

Cloud computing jobs will not be like the gold rush in the Y2K and dotcom jobs, rather it will be a steady job creation of about 10% per annum in the cloud computing sector for those with required education and ability.

The skillsets required for cloud computing jobs are of a higher magnitude then the earlier skills needed for running code factories. Companies will have to rethink their hiring strategy and talent retention for their cloud computing business, else they will not achieve their cloud computing business goals.

And verticals...

The trends in relation to better penetration will be in the government, healthcare, FMCG and bioinformatics. Government will be able to deliver cost effective e-governance by use of cloud computing, healthcare for delivery of services to the under serviced population, FMCG will leverage on mobility and cloud for distribution and market analytics, bioinformatics will use it for new discoveries and insights.

Role of the management...

Cloud will continue to grow and by the end of 2013 the businesses that leverage on the cloud will create immense value for their shareholders.

 

The role of the reluctant CIO will be limited to the network and infrastructure management and the CISO's role in securing the organizational risk will be enhanced as cloud computing adoption gains momentum. Using cloud computing for business innovation and strategy will be driven by the business leaders especially the CEO/CFO/CMO.

A new role in organization will emerge known as the CDO or Chief Data officer who will be responsible for operations, governance, risk, compliance, hygiene and analytics of Big Data for business value creation. There will be a consolidation of various cloud players especially in the Big Data Analytics and Cloud Security and Risk Management by Merger and Acquisition or hostile takeovers by larger corporations.