Objectives of the Project

Discuss about the Advantages and Disadvantages of Cloud Computing for Businesses.

Cloud computing is the specific part of information technology, which is responsible for allowing omnipresent accessing to all the shared system resources[1]. The extremely high level services are frequently and well provisioned with the least managerial effort and hence this technology is accepted by all users. In simple words, cloud computing is the easiest mode of transferring data or information over the connection of Internet from any part of the world to other. This cloud computing always relies on the resource sharing for achieving economies of scale or coherence, which is same as public utility[2]. The third party clouds are responsible for focusing on the main business processes and not on spending of huge amount of resources on maintenance or other computer infrastructure. Cloud computing helps the businesses in avoiding or in minimizing the costs of the infrastructure of information technology. The applications could be easily run, without any type of complexity and also could be run faster[3]. The maintenance is very low and improvises manageability. There are various advantages and disadvantages of cloud computing.

The following literature review focuses on a brief discussion on the advantages and disadvantages of cloud computing in businesses. The literature review will highlight the project objective and project scope by outlining the main processes. Moreover, the importance of cloud computing in any business will be provided here.

The objectives of this project of advantages and disadvantages of cloud computing in business are as follows:

1. i) To understand the various advantages of cloud computing that would be useful for any business.
2. ii) To understand the several disadvantages of cloud computing that would be harmful for the business.

The scope of this project is finding out the benefits or demerits of cloud computing within any business or company. Moreover, it will be helpful in knowing the delivery of services through Internet.

Importance of Cloud Computing in Businesses

Cloud computing is the successful delivery of all types of computing services like servers, databases, software, storage, analytics, networking and many other on the Internet[4]. The organizations that are eventually offering all these services are known as the providers of cloud or simply cloud providers. They charge for providing services of cloud computing on the basis of their usability[5]. In today’s world, most of the popular organizations have taken the technology of cloud computing within their business. The most significant uses of cloud computing in any particular business are as follows:

Creating New Apps or Services: The first and the foremost usability of cloud computing is while creation of new applications and services in any business.

Scope of the Project

Storing, Backing up and Recovering of Data: The next important and significant usability of cloud computing is the operation of data[6]. The data storage, backing ups of data and recovering data or information are done with the help of this cloud computing.

Hosting Websites or Blogs: Another important use of this cloud computing within any specific business is the hosting of websites and blogs. The websites or blogs of any particular business are extremely important as they are responsible for the successful advertisement of that business[7]. Cloud computing helps the business with hosting of the blogs and websites. Thus, it is extremely vital for that business.

Streaming of Audio or Video: The audio or video is easily streamed with the help of cloud computing. It is the procedure to deliver as well as obtain audio or video without downloading it. The end user does not have to download the audio and video. However, with the process, the end user has the complete file before even listening or watching the file[8]. The business can easily stream their audio and video and the customer will be able to obtain it without much complexities.

Delivering Software on Demand: Another significant usability of this cloud computing is the delivering software as per demand. The software needs to be delivered on time and cloud computing does that within less time and with less cost[9]. It does not incur huge time and cost and thus the business do not face any type of losses in their business.

Analyzing Data for Patterns as well as Making Predictions: The sixth important usability of this cloud computing in business is the analysis of data for understanding the patterns and thus making proper predictions for the betterment of any business[10].

The importance of cloud computing or the reasons of cloud computing in any business are given below:

Anytime and Anywhere: The first and the foremost importance of cloud computing within any specific business is the flexibility to use this service anywhere and anytime[11]. The technology allows or enables the business in accessing the information wherever and whenever there is connection of Internet.

Avoiding Disasters: The second significant reason for utilizing cloud computing in any business is to avoid all types of disasters. There is always a backup plan for disasters in cloud computing and thus the organizations opt for this particular technology[12]. Crashing of servers is a basic phenomenon in any business with sensitive information. Cloud computing helps to reduce this chance of disasters to a greater level.

Advantages of Cloud Computing for Businesses

Delivering Services with Higher Security: The next important reason for using this technology of cloud computing in any business is the successful delivery of any type of service with high security and privacy[13]. The information is safe and secured with this technology. 

Makes Business Environment Friendly: The fourth importance reason for utilizing cloud computing within any business is to make the business from traditional means to extremely environment as well as user friendly[14]. Cloud computing is responsible for eliminating the in house servers and thus there is no requirement of controlling climate for maintenance of servers.

Cloud computing can be simply defined as the paradigm of computing, where the larger systems pool is solely linked within the private as well as public networks for successfully providing dynamically scalable and flexible infrastructure for the purposes of storing files, maintaining data and applications[15]. The advancement and enhancement of this particular technology leads to the reduction of delivery cost, computation costs, hosting of application and content storage explicitly and significantly[16]. The technology of cloud computing is the specific practical approach for experiencing the benefits of direct cost and thus has the perfect potential for successfully transforming any data centre from the set up of capital intensive to any particular variable costly environment. It can also be defined as the significant principal of reusing all the capabilities of information technology[17]. The most significant difference between cloud computing and other traditional concepts like distributed computing, grid computing, autonomic computing and utility computing is to widen the horizon within the boundaries of organization. Cloud computing is responsible for streamlining all the processes and procedures of information technology, thus making the regular computing absolutely easier[18]. There are various other advantages of this particular technology that are helpful for any company or organization. The most significant advantages of cloud computing for any business are as follows:

Easy Implementation: The first and the most important advantage of cloud computing in any business is the easy implementation process. The entire procedure of implementing this particular technology is extremely easier and thus does not incur huge complexities[19]. Thus, the business can easily retain the similar applications and the processes of the business do not have to deal with any type of backend technicalities. The processes are easily managed by the connection of Internet and the infrastructure of cloud could be accessed by the businesses quickly and rapidly.

Easy Accessibility: The second important and significant advantage or benefit of cloud computing for any specific business is the easy accessibility. The data could be accessed from anywhere irrespective of the time and location[20]. The cloud infrastructure helps in maximizing the productivity of the business and also increases the efficiencies by simply ensuring that the application is accessible. The advantage of accessibility enables for easy and simple collaboration and thus sharing within the users located in various locations.

Disadvantages of Cloud Computing for Businesses

Requirement of No Hardware: The third significant advantage of the technology of cloud computing is the need or requirement of no hardware. As all the services are hosted on the cloud itself, the physical storage centre is not required any more[21]. However, the backing up of data is required for any type of disaster within the database thus making the productivity of the organization stagnant (See Appendix A).

Costs Per Head: Another significant advantage of cloud computing is the cost per head[22]. The costs of overhead technology are solely kept at the lowest with all the services of cloud computing, hence enabling the organizations in utilizing excess resources and time for the improvement of infrastructure of the company.

High Scalability and Flexibility: This is again one of the most significant advantages of cloud computing. This technology could be easily scalable as well as flexible for allowing the businesses in adding up or subtracting the resources that are completely based according to their requirements[23]. When the organizations flourish, the system also flourished with them due to this flexibility and scalability.

Efficient Recovery Plan: The sixth important advantage of cloud computing in any particular business is the presence of the plan of efficient recovery. This technology is responsible for delivering the services extremely faster and with absolute accuracy[24]. The data or the applications could be easily retrieved with this. The downtime is extremely less and thus it is claimed as the most efficient as well as effective recovery plan.

Data Recovery or Availability: The business that are dealing with bulk amount of data always have the chance of losing the data. Various problems can occur due to this. The operational teams of cloud computing thus support and provide perfect clustering and failing over[25]. Moreover, it helps to replicate the data and monitor the system properly like transactions, logs and many more. It helps to provide data recovery and disaster recovery for any type of disasters within the data or information. The performance and capacity of the data or applications are solely managed by cloud computing in any organization (See Appendix A).

ncreased Storage: The next important advantage of cloud computing is the increment of storage[26]. The cloud providers provide massive infrastructure for the users and thus the users could easily store and maintain bulk amount of data.

In spite of having such vast and significant advantages, cloud computing does comprise of various disadvantages that are extremely vulnerable and threatening for any particular business[27]. The most significant disadvantages of cloud computing in any business are given below:

Importance of Cloud Computing in Business

Protection of Data: The first and the foremost disadvantage of cloud computing in a business is the lack of security or protection to the confidential data. The organizations are often extremely reluctant in buying the assurance of data security of a business from the respective vendors[28]. They are afraid of the loss of data in competition and the confidentiality of data of the clients. In several instances, the main location of storage of data is not disclosed, thus adding excess security to the data. Within the existing models of cloud computing, there are firewalls present in the data centres for protection of the sensitive information and data[29]. The service providers of cloud are eventually responsible to maintain the security of data and the organizations have to rely on these providers (See Appendix B).

Management Capabilities: The second important disadvantage of cloud computing is that lack of managing capabilities[30]. Although, there are several providers of cloud, the platform or the infrastructure of cloud could be easily managed. The auto scaling feature is the most important need in any business and there is thus a greater potential in improving the scalability and flexibility.

Lack of Control: The next important disadvantage of cloud computing is the lack of control within the cloud. When the services are being moved to the specific cloud, the business is handing over their confidential data and information to the cloud provider[31]. This becomes a major problem for the IT businesses as they do not have any control over the data any more.

Dependency on Internet: The fourth significant disadvantage of cloud computing involves he dependency on the connection of Internet. Any cloud service could not be utilized without the help or connection of Internet. They are solely dependent on the Internet connectivity and the data could be retrieved or stored only when there is data connection[32]. This Internet dependency becomes extremely difficult for the businesses and thus the organizations do not want to opt this cloud (See Appendix B).

Regulatory Restrictions: The regulatory restrictions are dangerous for the organizations and thus they are dangerous for them. The government regulations never allow the sensitive information or personal information of the customers in physically located or stored within any country or state[33]. For meeting all the requirements, the providers of cloud required to be setting up of the data centre or the site of storage explicitly or exclusively in the country for complying with all the regulations. This type of infrastructure is not at all feasible and hence it is a major challenge for the providers of cloud[34].

Lack of Redundancy: The sixth disadvantage of cloud computing is the lack of redundancy. The server of cloud is neither redundant nor it could be backed up[35]. Since the technology could be failed, the business always has to purchase a redundancy plan. It is an extra cost for the businesses.

Issues in Bandwidth: The final disadvantage of cloud computing is the issues within bandwidth[36]. These issues become major problems for the business who are utilizing the cloud computing and do not wish to pack huge amount of storage devices and servers into a smaller set of data centre.

Conclusion

Therefore, from the above literature review, it can be concluded that cloud computing is the technology for successfully delivering any hosted service on the Internet. It allows the organizations in consuming compute resources like a VM or virtual machine, an application or a storage. These are utilized as the utility for building and maintaining the computing infrastructures. The most significant characteristics of cloud computing mainly include provisioning of self service, elasticity, flexibility, easy to migrate, pay as per utility, resilience to workload and many more. There are four types of deployment models in cloud computing. They are the private cloud, public cloud, hybrid cloud and community cloud. The three types of architecture models of cloud computing mainly include infrastructure as a service, platform as a service and software as a service. The main disadvantage of this technology is that it is completely dependent on the connection of Internet. Without Internet connectivity, it is not possible to cloud computing. However, still it is utilized by various organizations. The above literature review has clearly outlined the entire idea or concept of cloud computing in businesses. The several advantages and disadvantages of this technology within any specific business are properly discussed here. Furthermore, the importance and significance of this technology is also provided in this literature review.

Reference List

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