Impact of Cloud Technology and its Benefits for Education and Business

Cloud technology is a type of internet-based computing that helps store, manage and process data without a local server or large personal computer memory. The advanced use of cloud based technology is fascinating for most business organisations. The technology has a great impact on the lives of internet users.

In 2016, Forrester, an American market research company, estimated the public cloud market to grow to $236 billion by 2020. But in 2014, its 2020 estimate was only $191 billion and its 2011 forecast for 2020 was 20% lower. This indicates that use of the cloud has become so pervasive and most of the organizations are adopting it and creating enormous number of career opportunities. Two key sectors, which have benefited from the advent of cloud technology are education and business.

Education

Educational institutions in the developed countries are fully aware of the potential of cloud technology. They have leaped ahead to take benefit from it too. Using cloud computing, students access their lectures online effortlessly. They can also prepare and submit their assignments and exams online from their residence itself. In most of the developed countries, students are now able to study and complete their courses from any location.

Business

Cloud technology has made a positive impact for most businesses. For instance, Google Docs, Dropbox and other cloud storage applications have helped employees to work on multiple projects at the same time using effective online storage space. As a result, key projects are delivered on-time. These applications are also promising for employees to work from home, thus increasing productivity with minimum utilization of the resource.

Benefits:

Cost Effective

Every business wants greater productivity with low cost. Cloud technology is one stop solution for such requirements. It reduces expenses by minimizing the resource without affecting productivity. Since the cloud platform is utility based, you only pay for what you utilize, which is a competitive advantage. The users can access their data and applications from any gadget, irrespective of the time and location, using cloud technology.

Scalability

Scalability is the prime factor for any business to take their progress to the next level. For instance, a cloud based application with 10 users, when re-scaled by adding additional 5 users, performs the same way even after adding additional users to it. Cloud-based services have the ability to expand the computer resource based on the business needs.

Security

Cloud Technology offers various types of defensive actions such as patch management, cryptography methods, filtering etc. The technology is safe from hackers, bugs and accidents. Every cloud based solution is held within secured data centers, where actual physical access is controlled.

Conclusion

These are some of the impacts and benefits that cloud technology has on businesses. The technology has been accepted by many firms and business organisations. There are great career opportunities for both job seekers and entrepreneurs. For example, several large enterprises such as Yelp, Amazon, Flickr, YouTube and Facebook have already adopted it. The wide adoption is a perfect indicator that the demand for cloud technology will last longer.