Strategic importance of cloud computing in business organizations
Abstract
The business world today is concentrating on the buyer showcasing affirmations to the fast-changing needs of its customers. Therefore, there is a need for businesses to adopt technologies that will offer an added advantage in delivering services. Cloud computing is being integrated into the business environment to leverage the demand and supply of goods and services. Some of the core benefits of businesses using cloud computing are flexibility, ease of use and convenience, cost reduction and Reliability. The risks involved include malware attack, security and privacy issues. To overcome these challenges Organizations should use firewalls, develop regulatory policies and use of passwords. This paper discusses the strategic importance of cloud computing in business organizations.
Introduction.
In past years, businesses experienced obsolete technology which has caused the world to develop mechanisms to solve this. Cloud computing has emerged as a solution to companies in this current world. Cloud computing has become a trending technology in the business world. Cloud computing is a great innovation that has enabled businesses to integrate different services. Cloud computing has provided useful tools that have enabled businesses to deliver effective services for their customers (Nieuwenhuis, Ehrenhard, & Prause, 2018). Businesses that have embraced this technology have become competitive in their field. Through these tools, enterprises have aided in productivity and innovation. This services has enhanced flexibility, efficiencies and has reduced the costs of productions. Through computing resources like internet, storage and applications have aided these services. Different applications include financial applications, health applications and internet application. These are developments that support businesses to provide adequate services.
Cloud computing.
In the cloud computing overview, we describe different resources that aid in storage like the database. Cloud computing also deals with computer architecture that deals with the organization structure of the computing process in businesses. These structures include applications, platforms, unified resources and fabrics. Where the first layer is a fabric that contains all physical structures, hardware resources and computation devices, this layer also has various applications that execute and run in the cloud. The second division deals with unified resources which have virtualized assets which perform integrated properties.
The physical tools have been compressed to be an integrated resource. Platform layer is the third layer that has new resources that include middleware and services. This layer works to reduce the burden of installing applications directly into virtual engine flask. Through cloud computing has brought efficiency in the business world (Etro, 2009). This is enhanced since no need for specialized skills to access these services. These services are provided all day in the twenty-four hours. This has been of benefit to businesses through different platforms to develop and organize directly to the cloud.
Cloud computing has different characteristics that are dominant. They include ubiquitous access. These are cloud services that are accessible to the clients through standard procedures that enhance diverse customer platforms. These platforms include laptops and workstations. This enhances cloud services that can be accessed at any time through authorized communication devices that access the internet (Opara-Martins, Sahandi, and Tian, 2016). On-demand self-service is another service that involves server services and applications. These services are provided by service providers, who configure these services by creating a self-service entryway.
This characteristic has enhanced efficiency to the businesses since there is no traffic in service provision. Prompt elasticity is the capacity of cloud computing service to provide customer’s Service consistently. This services are availed on demand and automatically which has enhanced efficiency in businesses. The pooling of resources is also an attribute that has yielded benefits for the use of cloud computing to the companies (Nieuwenhuis, Ehrenhard, & Prause, 2018). This is where services are pooled together on a shared cloud device for storage. This is to serve various customers through multi-tenancy representations. This representations allow diverse cloud users to access services which may be accessed by other customers. This may be a challenge that may be experienced. Use of message is also a characteristic that has clearly developed. This is the ability of service provider to monitor the use of its services by the customer. It is based mainly by the timeframe where clients are charged for the Service, and the volume of Service used.
Different models have been developed to expound more on the use and the benefits that are resultant to use of cloud computing in business. These models include platform as a service, software as a service and infrastructure as a service. Platform as a service is a model that has a significant role in cloud computing, providing an environment for the application. They provide platforms which empower implementation and the sustenance of the applications. The service providers also need to provide for software, operating systems and also develop a database (Benlian, Kettinger, Sunyaev, and Winkler, 2018).
Software as a service is also a model that enhances effective working. It enables service providers to install software applications that allow customers to access as a service. This model can be accessed through subscriptions or paid for as they use. Users benefit since they do not need to install and maintain the software to use it. Infrastructure as a service is the last model layer service that deals with virtualization. It enhances the running of applications through its infrastructure (Etro, 2009). These models provide infrastructure and computational resources, which include networks and processing units. This model serves as a physical machine that supports the client’s application. In this way, it allows the users to organize and run applications and the operating systems. The user also enjoys limited responsibility to organize, maintain and administrate.
Benefits of implementing Cloud computing
When dealing with computing concepts, cloud computing appears to be unique in its mechanism of operation. The system is considered to be interactive and user friendly when it comes to its applications. Different businesses have different ideas on the impact of cloud computing on their activities. Some will contemplate it as a Dynamic expansion, involvement of softwares and simulation of Computer resources (Xue, and Xin, 2016). Cloud computing is playing a significant role in leveraging many operations in the business world today. This is enabling many businesses to stay afloat and at the same time, have a competitive advantage over others. Companies are benefiting optimally from using this technology while still improving their capabilities over traditionally computing systems.
Cloud computing increases Litheness in business activities, and it is this reason why most organization are adopting this technology. The Staff in the workplace is more flexible when they are working inside and outside the business premises. With Internet service, employees can work from anywhere regardless of the devices they are using. Services offered by cloud computing allow individuals to handle demand and supply of goods. Documents and files can be shared across the network concurrently (Benlian, Kettinger, Sunyaev, and Winkler, 2018). The technology allows the Staff to have an updated application on their phones and computers to access features. This has allowed supervisors to monitor the progress of operations in their business and create more time for other services. Managers can send their comments while employees can receive them simultaneously.
Cloud computing has decreased the cost of operation in different companies such as Amazon and Netflix. These companies have recorded a reduction in price since they started using cloud computing in their businesses. The technology allows employees to work from home hence reducing the cost of offices, workshops and other facilities. Cloud computing services allow businesses to pay for only the services they offer. According to Chang (2018), Facebook recorded a 45. 3% reduction in cost after adopting cloud computing services. This has motivated many businesses to adopt this technology to reduce the cost of operation. Subscriptions services offered by cloud computing have enabled different enterprises to save on huge losses. Using Service as a service model, resources are installed and organized quickly since all conducted by the providers.
Businesses do not need to worry about the technical part when developing the system. Cloud computing reduces the cost of workforce and staff training. When Information technology solutions are executed in business, problems of hardware maintenance emerge. However, Companies have faced the high cost of hardware replacement and maintenance by implementing cloud computing (Chang, 2018). The cost of buying hardware is shifted to other activities, reducing the cost and at the same time building a strong relationship with its customers, increasing the profit and standardizing the cost of services. Through updates and upgrades, cloud computing services encourage businesses keen to buy Stock Management chains and consumer association management apps due to low subscription charges.
Applications are accessed easily and immediately. With no costs for investment when accessing the app, it has led to on-time delivery of goods to the market. In addition to cost reduction, there exists a lower restriction on entry of products. Cloud computing is shortening the time taken to deliver goods to consumers. Businesses are utilizing cloud computing to maintain their competitive advantage over other business. Needs are changing fast, but with this technology, businesses can respond to consumers need in time. Individuals are using the internet to order goods and services any time anywhere (Clohessy, Acton, and Morgan, 2017). Small businesses can be able to regulate the use of resources with a change in consumer needs.
Scalability was not possible with traditional information technology solutions thus bringing lots of inconvenience during service provision. Many businesses are afraid to maintain their resources in all seasons, leading to a decrease in market demand and dissatisfaction of customers. With the implementation of cloud computing, businesses can overcome challenges and increase the satisfaction of their customers. Customers receive their goods quickly, and this helps in eliminating capacity scheduling. Cloud storage has improved the security and privacy of documents shared through the internet. Employees can share written reports to their supervisors(Gupta, Seetharaman, and Raj, 2013).
Businesses can choose the number of servers to use to store their data without paying for installation but only signing up for more storage capacity. The demand dictates the capacity you need to store data. The other benefit of cloud computing is that it increases the speed at which applications are deployed. Platform as a Service enables companies to maintain and develop their application. Companies can advertise their products through videos, photos on social media websites.
Negative Impacts of Cloud computing in business
Cloud computing has been an essential and helpful technology in businesses because of their positive impacts. Due to its advantages, many businesses have improved in performance and achieved competitive advantages over other firms. This is as a result of cloud cost reduction advantages. Despite cloud computing having a positive impact on business, adopting it has had detrimental effects and shortcomings (Xue, and Xin, 2016). These are causing significant challenges to business. These challenges include: stealing of business data, attacks through denial of services by hackers, authentication attacks and risks of data privacy, among others.
Stealing of data is the significant risk that a lot of business face by using cloud computing services. This is a result of an increase in the number of users hence causing the probability of attacks through virus cyber-attack and worms to be high. The data-stealing has mainly increased because a lot of business don’t have their servers; hence, they rely on third parties to be their source providers who end up stealing their data. data stolen from this business are confidential and may include profit and financial reports (Gupta, Seetharaman, and Raj, 2013). .Attacking through malware injection are risks that enterprises face when hackers change the regular running of a website or any web application through malicious applications. This allows them to steal data or to eavesdrop. The common type of malware injection is the SQL injection where the hackers attack businesses data through changing databases or information (Clohessy, Acton, and Morgan, 2017).
Authenticating attack is another security challenge where hackers access credentials of users and some confidential information. The denial of service attack is an attack used by hackers where they restrict the owners of the websites from accessing their services. They do this by loading the services with large amounts of data such that services are not available. The hackers send fake requests in such a way that they consume memory, and thus users do not get enough memory and space to use. Data privacy risks are risks which affect businesses as a result of insufficient controls and lack of regulatory compliance measures. Lack of this security access measures of data stored through cloud computing may lead to alteration and theft of data which would cause a significant fall down to the business, especially if confidential information is leaked.
Wrapping attack is an attack that weakens the web services. This type of attack usually occurs when hackers copy users account login details after which they alter the original data with malicious code. The servers then receive a message of approval of this message since not everything is changed, and as such, the hackers will access the Service.
There are various ways to overcome these negative impacts caused by cloud computing in business. Stealing of data can be solved by generating a special and unique number in every session of logging this brings about inconsistency hence preventing stealing of relevant information. Malware attack is resolved through storing the operating system information the first time of registration. The solution of authentication attack is to use key management and to use a more reliable identification management system. The denial of service attack can be solved using filters, signatures and firewalls. Further, the operating systems should be regularly updated and installed with the latest security updates.
Conclusion:
Cloud computing technology has been essential in transforming businesses. It gives businesses a competitive advantage. Businesses have benefited from cloud computing in various ways such as costs are reduced and especially the unnecessary charges such as the hardware and software maintenance costs. It allows automatic upgrading of the hardware and software. This technology has ensured agility in business operations in that they quickly deliver services. Lastly, a business can adapt to changes in the business environment. Despite cloud computing having its positive impacts on marketing, it has its shortcoming or adverse effects, especially on security and privacy issues (Gupta, Seetharaman, and Raj, 2013). Stealing of data, malware attacks, wrapping attacks, service denial attacks, data privacy risks and authentication attacks. Due to these risks, a lot of business has not been able to adopt cloud computing technology since they need security assurance. Security matters should be placed at the forefront in cloud computing to entice more businesses on using the services. The cloud service providers should thus enhance regulatory compliance measure. Finally, the providers should also come up with security policies, especially on managing risks and access controls.
Reference
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