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Cloud solutions can help businesses lower total costs and transition from a fixed cost structure to a variable one while freeing up critical IT resources for strategic initiatives and innovation. In case of Cloud applications cloud providers are responsible for the maintenance, operations, and bandwidth of the software and not the cloud customers. Finally, cloud applications are accessed through standard web browsers, providing scalability and agility to the customer. Unlike traditional on premise software applications, cloud applications are located and managed remotely and built with a single code-base customized to the company's needs. Some advantages of cloud computing are: Increased speed in responding to unforeseen events, Easy to get the latest updates, adoption is quick and simple, improved information security, deployment time decreases from years to months, lower risk with subscription based cost model. Increased strategic agility, short deployment times, lower risk and costs - the advantages of cloud computing are compelling. To know more, go to: http://blogs.sap.com/innovation/cloud-computing/6-benefits-of-cloud-computing-032893 

Customer relationship management deals with all types of interaction between a company and a customer, whether it is sales or service-related. Customer relationship management is generally used to explain the relationship between business houses and customers. CRM systems are also used to manage business contacts, clients, contract wins and sales leads. Technology Advancement have changed consumer buying behavior, and today there are many alternatives in which a company can get in touch with its customers and collect data about them. Technology and the Internet have changed the way companies approach customer relationship strategies. There are various benefits of CRM strategy like it helps  understanding the customer, retaining customers through delivery of better customer experience, attracting new customers, win new clients and contracts, increased profitability, decrease customer management and helps the companies to know what the customers and the general market want. To know more about CRM go to:http://www.webopedia.com/TERM/C/CRM.html

Big data, the huge amount of structured and unstructured information will slow down most traditional approaches to data management. Cloud providers such as Amazon Web Services are contributing powerful, profitable approaches to analyze big data. Analytics can make organizations "self-healing" or "self-optimizing."The AWS services directory has a mixture of SQL and NoSQL database technology. Amazon DynamoDB is a managed NoSQL database service has a single-digit millisecond latency that makes it a fine fit for big data project where fast line with the data is a must.  The first difficulty need to think in big data analytics is data amalgamation. Amazon Relational Database Service (RDS) is a relational database that can sort in the AWS cloud. Amazon Redshift  (Oracle), which is a petabyte-scale database intended for big data analytics and data warehousing. Finally, Amazon Elastic MapReduce is a Hadoop file system structure on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud decrease queries. Read more at: 

http://searchaws.techtarget.com/tip/Whats-what-in-AWS-big-data-analytics?asrc=EM_ERU_30984098&utm_medium=EM&utm_source=ERU&utm_campaign=20140630_ERU%20Transmission%20for%2006/30/2014%20(UserUniverse:%20932694)_myka-reports@techtarget.com&src=5265609

Digital enterprise, associated with the design, development and delivery of innovative products and services through online channels, is the result of a long, multi-year journey that includes cloud computing as a vital component. Saugatuck Technology analyst Mike West in a recent post says Business and IT leaders still have plenty of work ahead of them — even if they are well along in their cloud implementations. With its inherent ability scale, as well as providing immediate, on-demand access to the latest solutions and approaches, cloud provides ready-to-deploy environments for creating and delivering the innovative business strategies and products that are part of digital enterprise.  A separate Saugatuck survey of 203 enterprises finds at least 60 percent are now creating and delivering new digital products and services to customers and nearly 70 percent are enhancing or updating traditional products and services as a digital experience. Most organizations are still in the early stages of their digitization efforts, but Saugatuck expects digital enterprises to accelerate over the next three to five years. The ability to effectively deploy cloud will shape the speed at which enterprises go digital. Digital business success depends on “the availability and utility of increasingly powerful and flexible cloud-enabled, and cloud-delivered, technology and business services,” Guptill analyst at Saugatuck states. To know more go to: http://www.forbes.com/sites/joemckendrick/2014/06/29/are-digital-business-and-cloud-computing-joined-at-the-hip/

Cloud computing has become very popular in the last few years and many of the market researchers believe it to be the future but only if the security problems are eradicated. Not only businesses but also regular internet users are looking forward towards cloud computing through various ways like that of Dropbox, Google Docs and more to access their files in a fast, cheap and efficient manner. But this is one side of it. On the other hand experts are worried about the lack of data security it offers and the high risks of hacking involved. A recent survey reveals that 80 percent of the experts are suspicious on using cloud computing due to its security reasons. Cloud computing is at its nascent stage and it shall be given time so that the providers can improve over its security issues and to expand its usage freely in the coming future. Read more at: http://www.techtimes.com/articles/8449/20140615/cloud-computing-is-the-future-but-not-if-security-problems-persist.htm http://www.techtimes.com/articles/8449/20140615/cloud-computing-is-the-future-but-not-if-security-problems-persist.htm

The integration of cloud technology and advanced analytics allows organizations to find and use information to save money, deliver on the mission more effectively, create new value and make better decisions. Through Cloud Analytics, Booz Allen( a leading provider of management and technology consulting services to the US government in defence, intelligence, and civil markets) helps organizations gain valuable insights from large data sets, and—in the critical next step—strategically use that knowledge to drive mission success. Cloud Analytics is a data driven frontier; the term for a set of technological and analytical tools and techniques specifically designed to help clients extract information from massive data. For Booz Allen’s clients, cloud analytics involves more than algorithms. According to Booz Allen “we leverage our firm-wide expertise to provide clients with end-to-end solutions”. This includes bringing in teams of experts who understand the underlying issue to be solved, can make sense of the data for a specific organization, who can help the organization use it effectively, and who can develop tailored applications to maximize the value of the data. To know more about this, go to:http://www.boozallen.com/consulting/technology/cloud-computing/cloud-analytics

Cloud computing can help companies reduce their e-waste in several ways. John Biggs of TechCrunch recently discussed the effect that a design change of Apple’s devices would have on the amount of e-waste.The company will switch from its current 30-pin port (the rectangular outlet that connects iPods, iPhones, and iPads to docking stations and chargers) to a smaller 9-pin or 19-pin port. According to Biggs 45 million devices will become “partially” obsolete as a result of this minor change. The United States throws away about 3 million tons of e-waste every year, including about 30 million desktops, 12 million laptops, and 30 million computer monitors. The amount of e-waste increases year-to-year at the highest rate (5%) of any category of trash. E-waste accounts for 20-50 million tons or 5% of all the world’s solid waste. With cloud computing  companies no longer have to purchase, repair, or replace hardware for an on-site IT infrastructure when they sign up for cloud-based solutions. They will not have to dispose of all of their obsolete or broken servers, storage devices, networking hardware, and cables every year. Second, cloud hosting companies utilize hardware more efficiently. They can host multiple applications and infrastructures per server. As a result, cloud hosting providers purchase relatively small amounts of hardware and fully utilize their servers, storage devices, and networking hardware before disposing of them. Third, companies that adopt cloud-based solutions do not have to frequently repair or replace their end-user hardware such as desktops, laptops, keyboards, mice, and monitors. To know more about reduction of e-waste using cloud computing visit:  http://www.onthenetoffice.com/blog/2012/08/e-waste/

A Geographic Information System (GIS) integrates hardware, software, and data for capturing, managing, analyzing, and displaying all forms of geographically referenced information. GIS allows us to view, understand, question, interpret, and visualize data in many ways that reveal relationships, patterns, and trends in the form of maps, globes, reports, and charts. It helps you answer questions and solve problems by looking at your data in a way that is quickly understood and easily shared. There are a lot of advantages of using GIS technology. It makes data handling easier, covers large area, used for monitoring various things because of repetitive coverage, it is fast, can be used in inaccessible areas, unbiased, more accurate, reliable and economical. Data could be collected in several bands/ colors so it could be used for micro level analysis. GIS will help in decision making by government officials and in increasing transparency and accountability for good governance. It will help in management of natural resources, improved allocation of resources and planning, improved communication during crisis, cost savings by improved decision makings etc.

The effective use and implementation of Radio-frequency identification (RFID), GPS & data mining techniques in Public Distribution System (PDS) can facilitate PDS supply chain and promise eradicating mismanagement, corruption, trafficking, theft and anti-social elements. RFID provides highly accurate and detailed information by capturing the data and information at each stage of the supply chain, automatically. It also improves the safety and efficiency of the food supply chain. Location technology GPS can also be combined with RFID technology to automatically track and record the information regarding the field where the produce was picked, when and where it was transported and the current location of the produce. This also helps in reducing theft and trafficking. Data mining techniques based on the rule base classification model is used to identify the suspicious moving behavior of the objects. To read more: http://www.articlesbase.com/information-technology-articles/control-of-public-distribution-system-using-gps-gis-remote-sensing-with-data-mining-rfid-3393327.html

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There exists price war among major cloud providers. Amazon Web Services announced to lower the prices of a number of its cloud services, soon after Google cut down its prices. According to the vice president of Amazon Web Services, cost slashing is aggressive in nature. Slashing prices is a regular process. Whenever it is possible to reduce costs, they lower the prices for the customers.As soon as Google announced to reduce its  Google Compute Engine (GCE) by 32 percent, Google Storage  by 68 percent Amazon Web Services decided to cut its price of AWS' Simple Storage Service (S3) by 51 percent, Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2) by 30 percent to 40 percent, AWS' Relational Database Service (RDS) by 28 percent, ElastiCache service  by 34 percent on average.The repeated cloud price cuts make it hard  to run in-house operations, which would create both hardware costs and preservation costs costly. Read more at:

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9247216/Price_war_Amazon_cuts_cloud_costs_to_counter_Google

Disruptive technologies are technologies that will transform existence, commerce, and the worldwide economy. According to a report, there are twelve technologies that could bring massive economic alterations and disturbances in the coming years. The report also states how these technologies could modify our world, their profit and confront, and propose rule to help leaders’ .Business leaders should update their organizational strategy continuously with the developing technologies, and use technologies to progress inner presentation. Disruptive technologies can change the strategy for businesses, create completely fresh yields and services, and changing team of value between creators or from producers to customers. Organizations use business model improvement to arrest that value. Leaders need to presume from where risks are coming from and should look further than confirmed models. Organizations also need to make sure to keep their workers’ abilities advanced.Read more at:

http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/business_technology/disruptive_technologies

 As India is growing, the e-waste being dumped from the West is leading to generation of more e-waste. India has seen a dramatic change in laws for handling e-waste in India.In 2010 Indian lawmakers passed an e-waste policy that included Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR), before this there was an absence of e-waste recycling infrastructure to manage the country's wealth. EPR means that several business houses such as Apple, Dell and Hewlett Packard will be required to take financial responsibility for recycling their products. The Indian EPR law involves electronic manufacturers join hands with Indian recyclers (including the informal sector) to set up collection centres. In India this is the first time that a law includes informal sector participation. This means that informal sector recyclers who establish a legally recognized association and/or cooperatives will have an opportunity to participate in collection, refurbishing and dismantling of e-waste. To know more about e-waste and EPR go to:

http://svtc.org/blog/e-waste/what-does-indias-e-waste-law-mean/

Technologies, today, have enabled bank customers to make payments, track spending or move money between different accounts easily just by going online with a PC, phone or tablet. People are using popular websites like PayPal, for cheap loans and saving returns. Cash machines, ATMs have also become more advanced and multi-functional which means customers will soon be able to send money overseas, receive money transfers, purchase foreign currency and carry out transactions such as applying for loans. According to futurologists, smartphones will become mobile wallets soon enabling a customer to use discount vouchers and earn cashback on any transactions.  Banks will also have to exploit social media well i.e. listening to customers and have conversations on networks such as Twitter and Facebook. Mobile banking also helps banks to know the physical location of their customers and provide services accordingly. For example, banks might text to offer foreign currency when the customer arrives at an airport. However, new rules and improved technology have made it easier to switch current accounts and will make it even easier in future which in turn provides enough incentives for the banks to excel in technology, in all aspects of their service. Read more at:http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/public/moneymatters/article3925149.ece

Businesses don't want a machine that can do everything reasonably well. But, they want a computer that excels at specific tasks. Businesses are being experimented with clusters of high-density and low-power servers known as microservers. These microservers are suited to the growing workloads found inside modern datacenters. The quantifiable nature of workloads allows microserver circuitry to be paired back to what's needed to execute these tasks. To know more on the microservers, go through the article by Nick Heath, chief reporter for TechRepublic UK.

http://www.zdnet.com/microservers-what-you-need-to-know-7000027388/

Many companies are trying to figure out how to make the best use of big data and which skills are most needed when trying to get useful business insights out of unstructured data. With hard technical skills, managers are also looking for some more unexpected skills too. Creativity, developer background, business intelligence expertise, data science expertise are some of the important skills which a manager looks for. To know more on this, go through the article by Colin Barker, senior reporter for ZDNet.

http://www.zdnet.com/what-skills-do-companies-really-want-on-their-big-data-team-7000025945/

Cloud is the most scoring buzzword in technology and business spaces. Everyone is talking about the business benefits of cloud - benefits like cost, affordability, storage, etc. It is known to all of us.

Cloud has a flip side also. While there is no problem with data storage, but retrieving and uploading them is a problem. The problem is because of limited bandwidth. But, the way everything is now becoming connected – from jet engines in airplanes to mobile devices in your hands, we cannot reject data connectivity. It is not possible either – because predictive analytics has gained prominence where real time data serves as input and the analytics tools are located remotely. Third and fourth generation cellular networks are simply not fast enough to stream data to and fro. When there is a problem, there must be a solution to it. Experts are saying to stop concentrate on cloud and look at an alternative approach. Christened as ‘fog computing’ by Cisco, it has some edges over cloud computing. In cloud computing, where devices are distant and remote, in fog computing, it is just the reverse. Things are done near to the devices that are not so much powerful, but can make decisions.

So, the next time you go for cloud computing, give a thought over fog computing. Know more about it at: http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304908304579566662320279406?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702304908304579566662320279406 .