Microsoft MD, Paul Rellis, proved to be a big attraction amongst Waterford businesses as almost 100 people attended a business briefing entitled “The Future is the Cloud.”
The event was sponsored by Waterford based HCS Business Solutions and co-hosted with Waterford Chamber of Commerce.
Cloud computing has been prevalent in the news recently as it has the potential to create almost 20,000 new jobs over the next decade in Ireland. The impact report, carried out by Goodbody Economic Consultants for Microsoft Ireland claims that Ireland is perfectly poised to capture “a disproportionately large” share of the global cloud market, which is estimated to be worth around €70bn by 2014.
Paul Rellis said that cloud computing will give huge opportunities to individuals and companies alike. “The power of computing that was once the preserve of large organisations can now be used by every organisation of every size. Cloud computing is a new industry that Ireland can take advantage of very quickly. The technology space changes so rapidly but this is a transformation that will be sustainable over the next couple of decades.”
Mr. Rellis added “If Waterford businesses concentrate on developing competencies in cloud computing, perhaps working with the Waterford Institute of Technology to develop those competencies there is nothing to stop the huge opportunities available in job creation.”
“It is up to the civic authorities, institutes of technologies and so on to try and make a difference here. There is no reason they can’t be more successful in Waterford than in any other part of the country.”
Neil Phelan, Director of HCS Business Solutions, which a certified Microsoft Partner, added the future is undoubtedly cloud computing.
“Technology has moved on so quickly. We moved from mainframe computing in the 70’s, to PC’s in the 80’s, the Internet and .com era of the 90’s and noughties, and now leveraging on the internet era the cloud is set up to take a big leap over the next decade.”
“Although some questions arise around challenges to adopting cloud services security will inevitably be a concern. Just like the internet era consumers and business people were afraid to use their credit cards on-line or do their banking on-line in the early days, now it is the norm. This same pattern will inevitably occur to the use of cloud based services for businesses.”
Mr. Phelan added that most companies and consumers are already using some form of cloud technologies and may not consider themselves as being cloud users. Services such as Online Backup and Remote Email Filtering are cloud based technologies that are being utilised already by many companies.