Act II — Why the deal was good | Digital Infrastructures at Scale

You turn on a cloud server. Ten minutes, and it’s running. The old way was four months of procurement paperwork to get you one.

Real money is now riding on somebody else doing that job.

Is it worth it?

Business Model Canvas for IaaS Providers

The Business Model Canvas is a strategic management tool that serves as a visual framework for developing and discussing business models. For additional information, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Model_Canvas. The business model canvas has nine basic building blocks. These define the interconnections and relationships within a business model. The example used in this section is Amazon Web Services (AWS), particularly EC2 (virtual machines on demand). This is an Infrastructure as a Service offering. The power of the business model canvas approach becomes clear when we see how it can distinguish between various cloud service offerings. ...

Business Model Canvas for SaaS Providers

In this unit, we’ll explore examples using two hypothetical SaaS providers: one offering bookkeeping software and the other a project collaboration platform. Customer segments (CS) In the Business Model Canvas, “Customer Segments” are the groups of customers that the company ultimately serves, I.e. the ones that consume and pay for the services. It is characteristic of the SaaS model that this could basically be anybody, not just IT people. Let us just remind ourselves that customers here are the ones that use the service to get their business done, or get their personal lives in order. In a business context we often also have to distinguish between the user and the organization that purchases the solution. This is very likely true in the case of our bookkeeping software company. ...

Selecting Software Providers

Whenever we need a new piece of software, big or small, there are a few alternative roads to follow. They include: Buy the software Use some SaaS, paid or freemium Use an open source solution Build it yourself This is true for individuals as well as large corporations, and for stuff that you spend less than 10 minutes thinking about up to projects that take hundreds of man-years to complete. ...

Network Neutrality: who pays the ferryman?

The ancient Greeks put a coin in the mouth of their dead, to pay Charon for the crossing to the underworld. They did not argue about who should pay the ferryman. On the internet, there are many providers between you and YouTube. Who pays them? Or, to put it more pointedly, who is allowed to charge whom for the service? This is about “network neutrality” and remains a topic of intense discussion and legislative action. ...