Articles from Ed Sperling

1. The Limits Of Virtualization Explore Forbes.com (Oct 4 2010) Cloud Computing , Servers Change is coming to the data center, but not all of it is as good as it sounds. Virtualization and cloud computing have been billed as the next wave for enterprise computing. Taken together these approaches can save a corporation big bucks, improve efficiency through better utilization of server capacity, and in many cases improve performance because they rely on the latest hardware and software. But while this is considered the foundation of the next-generation data center, there are limits to what virtualization and cloud computing can achieve. Forbes caught up with Dave Hart, chief technology officer of systems integrator Presidio, to talk about the myths and reality of what he's seeing in IT departments around the country. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Forbes

2. Data Centers: From Physical To Virtual Explore Forbes.com (Jun 21 2010) Cloud Computing What's changing in the data center and where the new bottlenecks will be. The shift from physical to virtual data centers sounds great on paper. Chief information officers can score points with their chief financial officers for adding efficiency and cutting costs. They can win praise from users within their organizations for adding flexibility and speed. But they also can encounter new bottlenecks, open the door to new security threats and face new integration problems that can slow down the entire operation. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Cisco   Forbes

3. Anatomy Of The SAP-Sybase Deal Explore Forbes.com (May 17 2010) Cloud Computing Ever since SAP announced its plan to buy Sybase for $5.8 billion there's been a lot of speculation about just what it means for Oracle. SAP and Oracle are rivals in the enterprise application space, and if this deal goes through they'll be rivals in the database market, as well. But the real effects of this deal may be more diffuse and much harder to pinpoint than a simple arms race between two rivals. While it's true that SAP ( SAP - news - people ) and Oracle aren't particularly fond of each other, there are several factors that are changing the value of databases inside corporations. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Oracle   IBM   Ed Sperling

4. Keeping Out The Bad Guys Explore Forbes.com (May 3 2010) Cloud Computing Nuclear secrets and the Internet go together like locked doors and master keys. There is so much complexity in software code--not to mention the large quantity of code itself--that trying to find all the security holes and keep them plugged is a full-time job for an army of security experts. So where are the biggest threats, how do they get in the door and how do you stop them? To shed light on this world, Forbes tapped Tom Pyke, former CIO of the U.S. Department of Energy. Prior to that, he was CIO for the Commerce Department and at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   Google   Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

5. The Other Risks In Offshoring Explore Forbes.com (Apr 26 2010) The big worry in outsourcing and offshoring has always been data theft. There are armed guards situated outside the doors of many outsourcing companies and heavy security even on the inside. But the bigger threat may have less to do breaking into the building and stealing intellectual property than the plume of smoke emerging from a volcano in Iceland or a terrorist attack in India. Natural disasters, geopolitical unrest and infrastructure breakdowns can wreak havoc on outsourcing or offshoring operations. And even worse, they almost always surprise the companies doing business there. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Iceland   Forrester Research   Ed Sperling

6. Computing Gets Flexible Explore Forbes.com (Apr 26 2010) Cloud Computing Changes in computing are coming to a device near you. It may sit on your desktop, rest on your lap or fit in your pocket, but the way it interacts with the corporate data center will undergo a dramatic shift over the next few years. What used to be a strict division between client and server is no longer so easily definable. Computing may still be done inside the data center or on a PC or any other portable or desktop device, but exactly where the processing occurs may not be visible to the corporate user, or even within the user's control. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Forbes

7. More Tweets From The Enterprise Explore Forbes.com (Apr 12 2010) Social networking and enterprise computing never looked so good together. In fact, they never looked like a match at all. For starters there are gaping security issues. When you open the floodgates to social media you allow in criminal hackers, corporate spies and an assortment of other people that should never be allowed anywhere near a corporation's data. And social media is a spectacular entry point for the wrong kind of people because its very premise is based on a free exchange of ideas. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Ed Sperling

8. Next-Generation Data Centers Explore Forbes.com (Mar 15 2010) Cloud Computing , Servers Cloud computing may be getting the headlines, but that hasn't diminished interest in building new data centers. The new data centers are being designed differently, though. They're more modular, more flexible and much more accepting of new technology as it becomes available. The idea of building a data center every decade has met with the economic reality inside most companies. It's simply too expensive. So what exactly is different? Forbes sat down with Steve Sams, vice president of site and facilities services at IBM ( IBM - news - people ), to find out. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   ASHRAE   IBM   Interactive Data Corporation

9. Computing's Swinging Pendulum Explore Forbes.com (Mar 8 2010) Cloud Computing , Servers The stampede to outsource computing into the cloud has some interesting consequences. Rather than further distributing computing, it's actually centralizing much of the data, and more importantly, the control of that data. It took almost four decades to fully distribute computing from mainframe computers to PCs and then to a slew of portable devices such as smart phones. The whole argument for the client/server era of computing was that it moved computing closer to the user, distributed the processing and provided universal access to corporate data that used to be regulated by IT departments. (Read Full Article)

   Comment Mentions:   Ed Sperling

10. Rethinking IT Explore Forbes.com (Feb 22 2010) Cloud Computing How virtualization and the cloud are changing the most fundamental aspects of computing. Virtualization and cloud computing may seem like buzz words at the moment, but in the future they hold the potential to completely reshape computing. What used to be a world dominated by Microsoft or IBM could well transform into one dominated by middleware that reaches well beyond a corporation's corporate campus. Not all of the problems are worked out yet. But the vision for what could happen is one of the most fundamental shifts in the history of corporate computing. To help shed light on this change, Forbes caught up with Pat Gelsinger, president and COO for EMC's ( EMC - news - people ) information infrastructure products, and previously one of Intel's ( INTC - news - people ) top technology gurus. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Oracle   IBM   Forbes

11. Cloud Computing Heads South Of The Border Explore Forbes.com (Feb 15 2010) Cloud Computing In North America cloud computing is viewed as a way of cleaning up the data center, cutting costs and adding flexibility. South of the border in Latin America it's a whole different story. Rather than streamlining IT operations and rationalizing costs, many smaller companies see it as a way of instantly ramping up to an even playing field with some of their larger competitors. Forbes caught up with Rodolfo Garcia, president of Terremark Worldwide's ( TMRK - news - people ) Latin American business unit, to talk about what's changing. Terremark Worldwide provides IT infrastructure services. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Forbes

12. Warming Up To Iceland Explore Forbes.com (Jan 11 2010) Power and Cooling , Carbon Footprint , Geothermal Moving data centers out of the big cities to places where power and cooling is cheaper has been under way for the better part of a decade. Companies like Google ( GOOG - news - people ) and Microsoft ( MSFT - news - people ) are locating data centers in the cool and windy Columbia River Gorge in Oregon. Others have moved to Arizona, where nuclear power is plentiful and cheap. Still others have buried data centers beneath the ground in old mines, where the temperature is always cool. Data centers are expected to move to even more extreme locations over the next decade. Forbes caught up with Tate Cantrell, chief technology officer at Verne Global--a data center developer based in Iceland and Washington, D.C., to talk about the shifts and what's driving them. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Iceland   Europe   Google

13. Your Tax Dollars At Work Explore Forbes.com (Jan 11 2010) Cloud Computing , Servers he U.S. Department of Energy's decision to dole out $47 million in research funding to improve energy efficiency in data centers is an interesting approach to the problem. It's also one that will stir up some controversy for years to come. On one hand, it rewards the same companies that created the energy problems now plaguing data centers. On the other, it offers a carrot to those companies, as well as others that have come along since then, to find ways to boost efficiency everywhere. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Intel   Department of Energy   IBM

14. Not Everything Will Move To The Cloud Explore Forbes.com (Jan 4 2010) Cloud Computing When Rackspace opened for business at the end of the last century, people thought it was a wannabe Electronic Data Systems. Since then it has evolved into one of the largest cloud operations on the planet with an estimated 60,000 servers and data storage that is increasing by a mind-boggling 1 petabyte a month. So what better place to look at how data management is changing? Forbes caught up with John Engates, Rackspace's chief technology officer, to talk about the evolution and where things are likely to go in the future. Article Controls EMAIL PRINT REPRINT NEWSLETTER COMMENTS (1) SHARE YAHOO! BUZZ Forbes: How has your business model evolved? Engates: In the early days, most people thought that if you needed a server, you rented a rack, installed your server and managed it. We said it could be easier than that. Just pay a monthly fee. Back in ... (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   IBM   Forbes

15. Security In A Cloud Explore Forbes.com (Dec 21 2009) Cloud Computing How secure is cloud computing? And does it matter if a company outsources to more than one cloud provider? CIOs have been asking these kinds of questions for months as they attempt to clean up their data centers by outsourcing some applications and virtualizing others. Forbes caught up with Art Coviello, president of RSA, the security division of EMC ( EMC - news - people ), to broach some of their concerns. Article Controls EMAIL PRINT REPRINT NEWSLETTER COMMENTS (1) SHARE YAHOO! BUZZ Forbes: What do companies need to consider when looking at clouds? Art Coviello: Clouds could serve a division of a company or an individual application. But each one has to be looked at from a security perspective. And you have to look at compounding of risk if you have multiple clouds. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   Google   Forbes

16. The Data Center Of The Future Explore Forbes.com (Dec 14 2009) Construction , Cloud Computing The data center of the future, to the untrained eye, will look very much like the data center of the present. It will still have rows upon rows of server racks and massive storage farms. But look more closely and some significant changes start coming into focus. For starters, most large data centers will not be owned by the companies that use them. Corporations may still need to keep modest data centers in-house to run essential services and host some applications that are considered an essential part of their DNA, but the rest of the stuff will be hosted in other locations by a number of service providers. In fact, one of the CIO’s primary responsibilities will be to manage a portfolio of these service offerings from other companies. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com

17. Building Your IT From Scratch Explore Forbes.com (Dec 14 2009) Construction What would a data center look like if an established company could start all over again? That’s exactly what happened when chemical giant J.M. Huber spun off its kaolin mining unit last year, a business that already had a full roster of customers and deep know-how about how to run its business--but no IT infrastructure or business processes of its own. Forbes caught up with Senad Hadzic, CIO of KaMin LLC, to talk about the new company’s IT strategy. Article Controls EMAIL PRINT REPRINT NEWSLETTER COMMENTS SHARE YAHOO! BUZZ Forbes: What happened to your data center when KaMin was spun off? Hadzic: There was no data center. We started from zero. We bought the assets of the company and then we had to create an information technology platform from scratch. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Oracle   IBM   Forbes

18. How Green Is Green? Explore Forbes.com (Dec 11 2009) Monitoring , Carbon Footprint , Cloud Computing , Servers IBM says the carbon footprint of a data center tells you how green it is. Look inside almost any data center these days and you'll find initiatives under way to consolidate servers, improve server utilization rates and cut overall power consumption. These are all green initiatives, but what exactly makes a data center green? Forbes posed that question to IBM ( IBM - news - people ) CIO Pat Toole. IBM claims to have two of the greenest data centers. So how do you prove it? You can't. "There are no industry standards on that," Toole says. "The best way to measure it is the carbon footprint of the data center. We have a dashboard that helps us manage the energy consumption of the data center." (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Cisco   Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory   IBM

19. The IT Side Of Acquisitions Explore Forbes.com (Dec 7 2009) Cloud Computing The data center is one of the most complicated places on earth. There are legacy systems and data integration issues, spiraling costs for cooling and powering racks of servers, concerns over integration, security, outsourcing and virtualization--as well as data storage overload. Collectively, these interactions are enough to make any CIO throw up their hands in frustration. But what happens when corporate acquisitions are thrown into the mix, each with its own flavor of these same problems? Forbes caught up with Carol Fawcett, vice president of global information services at Quest Software ( QSFT - news - people ), a company that has been on a regular buying spree for the better part of a decade. Article Controls EMAIL PRINT REPRINT NEWSLETTER COMMENTS SHARE YAHOO! BUZZ Forbes: How many companies has Quest acquired or shut down? Carol Fawcett: We haven't done a lot of shutting down. We've only done that once in the ... (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   Oracle   IBM

20. Intel's Cloud Chip Explore Forbes.com (Dec 7 2009) Cloud Computing , Servers After decades of pushing decentralization in the data center, the pendulum is decidedly swinging the other way. IBM ( IBM - news - people ) is making money with mainframes again, and Intel ( INTC - news - people ) is preparing to do battle against Big Blue in the next several years with a "single-chip cloud computer." That's another way of saying centralized processing. Instead of virtualizing applications across a data center and running those applications in a cloud comprised of multiple machines, Intel now is pushing to run them on a single chip with literally dozens of cores on the same machine. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Intel   IBM   Forbes

21. The Cold Truth About Data Centers Explore Forbes.com (Dec 1 2009) Cloud Computing , Servers It's often been said that the coolest place to work in a company is in the data center--literally. Racks upon racks of machines generate a lot of heat, and the fear is that they'll stop working if the heat goes too high. So while most employees sweat it out in an ecologically acceptable 78 degrees Fahrenheit during summer months, data center workers are kept well refrigerated--something that accounts for the exorbitant power bills for many data centers. In fact, the power bill for cooling many data centers is now one of the biggest operational expenses in a company. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   IBM

22. IBM: Back To The Future Explore Forbes.com (Nov 23 2009) Cloud Computing When IBM invented virtualization back in the late 1960s, the goal was to make mainframes more efficient. Fast-forward four decades and the company is returning to its roots--mainframes and virtualization. Why is this happening and how does IBM ( IBM - news - people ) see the data center changing? Forbes caught up with Pat Toole, IBM's CIO, to talk about what's different and why--and how the CIO's job ultimately will be affected by these changes. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   IBM   Forbes

23. The Next War Over IT Explore Forbes.com (Nov 16 2009) Cloud Computing , Networking , Servers , Storage Making sense out of the massive acquisitions and alliances struck by the enterprise systems vendors isn't easy. While it's clear that war has broken out, these companies are so large and complex that in some cases it's uncertain exactly who is fighting whom or in which geographical markets they're likely to clash. It's obvious this isn't business as usual, though. These are hostilities on a scale that hasn't been seen in the enterprise since the advent of the minicomputer in the 1980s and the commodity PC server in the 1990s. A technology shift is under way, and big companies are spending tens of billions of dollars to prepare for these changes. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   Amazon.com   Cisco   IBM

24. The Other Side Of Outsourcing Explore Forbes.com (Nov 2 2009) Everyone's doing it, so why shouldn't you? They're taking servers from the data center, consolidating some with virtualization, co-locating others through a third party and handing others off to cloud-hosting companies. The pitch from the cloud providers, as well as the software-as-a-service companies, is that no one should be doing what isn't their core competency. And besides, no one has the manpower left to effectively run all these servers or learn the applications as well as the companies that develop them or deal with them every day. For the CIO, it's also a good way to tell the CEO and CFO that you've been able to slash costs and apply those dollars for better purpose (Read Full Article)

    Comment

25. Inflection Points Ahead Explore Forbes.com (Oct 26 2009) Cloud Computing , Servers Every so often, technology reaches an inflection point where something else takes over, either because of physical limits of a particular technology, new developments in adjacent markets or because of a significantly changed pricing model. The minicomputer took over from the mainframe in the 1980s, and the PC has arguably displaced both of them in the decades since. In the past couple of years, virtualization has changed the business model for buying commodity servers, and cloud computing is changing the economics of the data center. (Read Full Article)

    Comment Mentions:   IBM   Microsoft Corp

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