Cloud Computing- A New Cost Model

CIO.com's Bernard Golden returns with his second installment of how cloud computing will cause an IT revolution. This time he looks at cost modeling cloud computing. Specifically instead of investing large amounts of capital expenditure (Capex) to build and maintain a computing infrastructure, the benefits of which would be realized over time (assuming that the organization makes effective use of the computing infrastructure and that the costs remain carefully managed). In contrast, cloud computing is modeled in the pay as you go model, or as the author notes operational expenses (Opex). Naturally this will have many implications, but perhaps the most notable is that it will allow companies, business units, and even individuals to be more creative and push the envelope with their use of IT resources. Since deploying cloud computing resources is fast, simple, and cheap the barriers to innovation are removed. Read the article.