Preparing for Cloud Computing: The Managed Services Revolution

This real-time, multi-tenant infrastructure is inherently complex, and customers will have concerns over its security and availability. Integrated, scalable, and cost-efficient management tools will be needed to ensure that the cloud computing infrastructure delivers the service levels customers expect, that it keeps data and applications safe, that it meets compliance and governance requirements, and that it provides customers with the same or better visibility and control as they had using internal resources. This paper explores the drivers for cloud computing, especially for communications service providers, many of which already have the foundations for a cloud computing infrastructure. It looks at the challenges that cloud computing infrastructures must address and the key management components providers will need to put in place to support a cloud computing business.