Cloud computing - An emerging trend in information technology

The concept of cloud computing is based on the time-sharing of costly resources and advantages of the economies of scale. Cloud computing applies conventional supercomputing, or high-performance computing power, to perform computations in consumer-oriented applications. It is a result of exploring ways and means to ensure availability of computing power to users through sharing of resources and algorithms to optimize the usage of infrastructure, platform and applications. A large number of these cloud clients employ centralized servers for most of their applications. These applications do not require any specific applications on the client, but the clients interface with the cloud application merely through a web browser. IT departments spend a considerable amount of time on implementation, maintenance, and upgrade of their applications. CIOs are favoring cloud-computing technology to minimize the time spent on application support and focus on core activities of the business. Usage of Cloud computing enables the IT function to minimize the costs and issues associated with servers, network, applications, upgrades and maintenance.