A Proposed Framework for Cloud Computing Adoption

1. Introduction

Since Year 2007 onwards, Cloud Computing has created positive impacts, business opportunities, large scale adoption and case studies for a growing number of users and organizations. Benefits include improvement in efficiency; offering added values for organizations; saving costs in operations, resources and staff − as well as new business opportunities for service-oriented models (Boss et al., 2007; Vouk, 2008; Briscoe and Marinos, 2009; Hayne, 2009; Schubert, Jeffery and Neidecker-Lutz 2010; Chang et al., 2010 a; 2010 b). In addition, it is likely that cloud computing which focuses on operational savings and green technology will be at the centre of attention in the near future.

There are academic and industrial efforts to define business models and profitability offered by Cloud. From academic perspective, Weinhart et al. (2009 a; 2009 b) propose their Cloud Business Model and suggest Cloud can offer business opportunities and profitabilities. Chou (2009) defines seven different business models for all types of organizations. Buyya et al. (2009) present Cloud economic models and demonstrate how SLA can be used for generating economic values. Buyya et al. (2010) also demonstrate applications and services developed for Cloud, and these services are helpful for start-up firms to generate additional revenues. Marston et al. (2010) describe detailed analysis of Cloud Computing business perspective, and present a table of a list of active players in providing Cloud products and services. They recommend their Cloud economics in their business-technology framework, where each Cloud service is rated high or low in terms of business and technology in their matrix.