Small And Medium Size Business Are Moving To The Cloud
The findings of Microsoft's global "SMB Cloud Adoption Study 2011," which looks at how cloud computing would affect small and midsize businesses (SMBs) over the next three years, was recently revealed. According to the report, 39% of SMBs anticipate paying for one or more cloud services in the next 36 months. In most countries, the number of cloud services SMBs pay for (as opposed to free) will roughly double in the next three years, according to the survey. Cloud computing evens the playing field by allowing small businesses to take advantage of advanced technologies without having to invest in IT infrastructure or personnel. eMarketing, web meetings, web seminars, sales force automation, CRM, asynchronous collaboration, event registration, and video chatting, for example, can all be done in the cloud, and the majority, if not all, of these, can be done for very little money. This enables small enterprises to virtualize, reducing overhead and increasing profit margins. ...