Posted by Rich Rao, Director of Sales and Operations, Google Enterprise

Working with Google and Analysis Group, MIT research scientist Andrew McAfee recently conducted a study to understand the comparative costs of a business moving to the cloud versus remaining with a traditional on-premise IT system. In this comparative cost model, McAfee finds that the typical small- to medium-business (SMB) will significantly reduce its IT costs by doing away with its on-premise technology and moving to the cloud.


For example, a business with 16-100 computers can expect to save 37% by moving to the cloud – even if there’s no IT labor reduction. With savings achieved by moving to the cloud, these businesses are able to invest in areas that help expand or strengthen their business, whether it’s opening a new branch, starting a new product line, or hiring more people.

Bill Hipsher, Director of Business Development at USstoragesearch.com confirms, "Over a one-year period, Google Apps cost one-quarter of what we were spending on our on-premise IT before moving to the cloud – and over our business lifetime, it drops to just one-tenth of the cost. The hardware, software and time savings helped us expand our call center, which led to the creation of more than 30 new jobs this year."

In his study, McAfee also notes that SMBs' technology use is a strong indicator for the future of IT. Because SMBs are more flexible in their decision-making and aren't bogged down by legacy costs, they're able to choose an IT system that best suits their business. Thus, moving to the cloud frees up money for SMBs to drive business and job growth, and can set a precedent for how large businesses adopt cloud technology.

At Google, we’re proud to work with SMBs across the country to help them save money and move to the cloud. Visit our website to learn more about moving your business to Google Apps and explore McAfee’s comparative cost model in Google Sheets to adjust and tailor the model to your business.

Posted by Ronen Lapidot, Senior Vice President of Information Technology, Perry Ellis International

Editors note: Today’s guest blogger is Ronen Lapidot, Senior Vice President of Information Technology at Perry Ellis International, a designer, distributor and licensor of apparel and accessories for men and women. Perry Ellis International joins other retail organizations in going Google. See what they have to say.

Far from a typical fashion house, our apparel spans a variety of categories including men’s and women’s clothing, accessories, children’s apparel, even evening gowns for the red carpet. In total, we manage a portfolio of some of the best known brands in fashion, including Perry Ellis®, Original Penguin®, Jantzen®, Laundry by Shelli Segal®, Nike® Swim, Callaway® and more. With 2,600 associates spanning across 65 store locations and 30 offices worldwide, we rely on technology to stay connected.


The increasingly fast-paced global economy of the past several years has made it even more important to be able to work together efficiently, act quickly and share information across the company to help us all understand the state of the business and act as one global team. We were using a popular, premise based email solution, but with so many offices around the world, we knew the only way to keep our brand fresh and our business agile was to move to the cloud.

With the help of Cloud Sherpas, we moved the entire company to Google Apps. Now our global teams are able to connect through Gmail’s video chat feature to meet “face to face” about upcoming projects, designs and merchandise. With so many offices in different time zones, it’s great to be able to give our associates the option to work where they’re comfortable, even if it’s just going home to have dinner with their families before a jumping on a video chat with colleagues in China or Indonesia. This has been especially helpful for offices with eight or ten hour time differences between them and has made us feel more like one cohesive team instead of siloed offices.

Being able to work together easily across offices not only brings the team closer together, it also saves significant time and costs. We recently opened two international offices in Indonesia and Bangladesh. Usually I travel to each location for weeks at a time to interview and hire employees and oversee the regional office openings. With Google Apps, we were able to interview job candidates via video chat and work with regional managers on important policies and resources that needed to be in place for these new offices and associates. I was elated to discover that what normally takes significant travel time and costs could be done right from my desk. I sat there amazed as I watched documents fill in with information from my colleagues across the world. I think that’s when I realized we were all going to be able to do things very differently, now that we were in the cloud.

Posted by Brittany Wenger, Winner of Google Science Fair 2012

(Cross-posted from Google App Engine Blog)

Editors note: Today’s guest blog post comes from 17-year-old Brittany Wenger, the winner of this year’s Google Science Fair. Brittany built an application on Google App Engine called the Global Neural Network Cloud Service for Breast Cancer. This artificial neural network can detect complex patterns in data, learning how to classify malignant or cancerous cells it hasn’t seen before. Learn more about her project.



When a patient has a palpable breast lump, the first step a doctor takes is to determine whether the mass is malignant or benign. One relatively simple diagnostic procedure is a form of biopsy called fine needle aspiration (FNA). Though these tests are less invasive than others, they are historically less accurate as well. My goal was to create a tool for doctors to use when interpreting test results from these procedures.

For this project, I decided to create a neural network built on Google App Engine, using data published to the Machine Learning Repository by the University of Wisconsin. A neural network attempts to replicate the brain as a form of artificial intelligence through networks of computers and can be used to detect extremely complex patterns. It learns from its mistakes, so it can classify a case it hasn’t seen before as malignant or cancerous based on specific criteria like clump thickness or bland chromatin. Because the diagnostic power of the network improves the more data it has, building on App Engine is a way to ensure the app can continue to scale easily, no matter how much information goes into the system.

I got started integrating my neural network application code, written in Java, with App Engine in a few hours using the SDK’s Greeting Service sample code as a starting point. The application has two main parts, a training module, that implements the neural network itself and runs the training process over the input data stored in static files, and a web interface that takes input data and returns the network’s analysis.

Google App Engine provides the scalable infrastructure I need to collect information from every hospital in the world and run when there are many concurrent requests, as usage of my application increases. Because my network is built as a cloud service, not only is my app working on the web, but mobile tablets, smartphones, old PC systems, or new technologies can also easily access the service from any hospital with an internet connection.

The neural network I developed is 99.11% sensitive to malignancy when using leave-one-out testing with original data. Thus far, I have run 7.6 million trials. Moving forward my goal is to make the application accessible to the global medical community so more data can be deposited and used to improve the diagnostic power of the network.

Posted by Alandha Scott, Google Apps Team

Editors note: Chief Financial Officers are key decision-makers in any organization’s move to the cloud. For a financial perspective on cloud computing such as Google Apps for Business, visit our United States and Europe websites or download the research reports.

We often hear from CIOs and IT leaders about the benefits they've seen since moving their organizations to the cloud. The role of the CFO in this decision is sometimes overlooked, but it's an important one.

We wanted to learn more about what CFOs consider to be the benefits of moving to the cloud, as well as their concerns. We recently surveyed over 800 CFOs in the United States and Europe, and we learned that almost 81% of our U.S. respondents say that they think completely implementing cloud technology would improve employee productivity, and 71% say it would reduce the time required to bring new products and services to market. In fact, in Europe 67% have adopted or are making plans to adopt cloud computing and 52% of American CFOs surveyed say their companies always include cloud-based systems in their IT decision-making processes.

Some of the benefits CFOs highlight include significant capital and operational savings, better security, and productivity gains that come from the ability to work from any device or together with others using tools like Google Docs. In our webcast, even self-described "archetypal CFOs" highlighted their hopes for improved productivity when employees can work from home or elsewhere, as well as reduced costs when moving to a service model. Furthermore, 69% of surveyed CFOs in Europe believe that cloud computing increases the IT department’s ability to innovate.

But it’s not just this research that shows how CFOs can benefit from adopting cloud technology. Since adopting Google Apps for Business, Milwaukee-based Journal Communications' VP of Finance has used Google spreadsheets to do his company’s acquisition models and financial reporting, saving time and ensuring that decisions are made with team input and the most up-to-date information.

Posted by Amit Singh, Vice President, Google Enterprise

Over the last two months I had the opportunity to spend time with hundreds of CIOs as we took Atmosphere – our annual cloud event – to 20 cities globally. What I heard from them boiled down to one simple idea: they’re looking for a better way to do things. Their employees want to work in collaborative environments without being tethered to their desks, and their IT departments are eager to shift resources from maintaining old technology to developing new ones.

These business leaders have experienced the power of living in the cloud and they want to bring that experience to the workplace. The cloud has certainly transformed my life by allowing my family to stay connected from all around the world. For example, at the São Paolo Atmosphere event, I joined a Google+ Hangout from my Android phone to wish my dad a happy birthday. This magic doesn’t need to be constrained to our personal lives. After all, we’re the same person at home and at work, and we like having access to the same devices and tools regardless.

A fundamental shift...
There was a time when business technology was at the forefront of innovation and productivity. Industries began to standardize around certain platforms that automated an individual’s work. But with complicated enterprise agreements, customer lock-in and limited competition, business technology lost its edge. IT professionals stopped innovating and relied on a handful of vendors who designed bloated software that was released every few years. At the same time, consumer technology took off. With the power of massive data centers, modern browsers and smart mobile devices at their fingertips, people found it easier than ever to communicate, create, and collaborate. Many people have fallen in love with the simplicity and freedom of these services, and they want to use them everywhere.

…to working in the future
This is where Google comes in. To provide a seamless transition from home to work (and back to home), we extended our popular consumer products–like Gmail and Google Drive–to meet the needs of businesses. For instance, Google Apps for Business provides an additional layer of enterprise features like delegated mailboxes, granular administrative controls, a 99.9% SLA, 24x7 support, migration tools, and an ecosystem of certified resellers.

We’ve also applied the same formula to other products that were born in the cloud: Google Maps Coordinate helps companies easily manage mobile workers; Chrome for Business gives you a consistent, personalized web experience on any device; Google App Engine lets you to build and host your own applications in the cloud; and Google Compute Engine allows you to rent Google’s infrastructure to operate at scale. With each of these offerings, you can access the latest innovation by clicking “refresh” in your browser.

We’re humbled that 5 million businesses (including BBVA and Roche), 66 of the top 100 U.S. universities, and government institutions in 45 of the 50 U.S. states have gone Google by choosing Google Apps to live and work in the cloud. We hear from these customers that alongside improving IT administration and individual productivity, Google Apps also helps teams of employees work better together. For example, Google documents let users collaborate in real-time and see each other’s edits as they happen. And now, with offline editing, users can continue working even without an internet connection.

As people have begun to embrace the cloud, some legacy enterprise vendors have started to offer their own cloud-labeled offerings. They claim to offer a bridge between legacy solutions and the cloud. But these offerings still rely on desktop products and on-premise servers, require heavy IT investment, have limited support for mobile devices, come with complicated pricing and licences–and ultimately they’re still focused on individual productivity. If anything, they offer a bridge to the past.

With the explosion of computing devices, ubiquitous high-speed internet, and mobile workforces, there’s a fundamental shift happening in business. The question is: do you want to cross a bridge to continue working in the past...or move to the cloud so you can live and work seamlessly in the future?

Get started with Google Apps or collaborate in real-time today with literary masters: Shakespeare, Nietzsche, Poe and more.

Posted by Craig McLuckie, Product Manager, Google Compute Engine

(Cross-posted from the Google Developers Blog.)

Over the years, Google has built some of the most high performing, scalable and efficient data centers in the world by constantly refining our hardware and software. Since 2008, we've been working to open up our infrastructure to outside developers and businesses so they can take advantage of our cloud as they build applications and websites and store and analyze data. So far this includes products like Google App Engine, Google Cloud Storage, and Google BigQuery.

Today, in response to many requests from developers and businesses, we're going a step further. We're introducing Google Compute Engine, an Infrastructure-as-a-Service product that lets you run Linux Virtual Machines (VMs) on the same infrastructure that powers Google. This goes beyond just giving you greater flexibility and control; access to computing resources at this scale can fundamentally change the way you think about tackling a problem.


Google Compute Engine offers:

• Scale. At Google we tackle huge computing tasks all the time, like indexing the web, or handling billions of search queries a day. Using Google's data centers, Google Compute Engine reduces the time to scale up for tasks that require large amounts of computing power. You can launch enormous compute clusters - tens of thousands of cores or more.
• Performance. Many of you have learned to live with erratic performance in the cloud. We have built our systems to offer strong and consistent performance even at massive scale. For example, we have sophisticated network connections that ensure consistency. Even in a shared cloud you don’t see interruptions; you can tune your app and rely on it not degrading.
• Value. Computing in the cloud is getting even more appealing from a cost perspective. The economy of scale and efficiency of our data centers allows Google Compute Engine to give you 50% more compute for your money than with other leading cloud providers. You can see pricing details here.

The capabilities of Google Compute Engine include:

• Compute. Launch Linux VMs on-demand. 1, 2, 4 and 8 virtual core VMs are available with 3.75GB RAM per virtual core.
• Storage. Store data on local disk, on our new persistent block device, or on our Internet-scale object store, Google Cloud Storage.
• Network. Connect your VMs together using our high-performance network technology to form powerful compute clusters and manage connectivity to the Internet with configurable firewalls.
• Tooling. Configure and control your VMs via a scriptable command line tool or web UI. Or you can create your own dynamic management system using our API.

At launch, we have worked with a number of partners - such as RightScale, Puppet Labs, OpsCode, Numerate, Cliqr and MapR - to integrate their products with Google Compute Engine. These partners offer management services that make it easy for you to move your applications to the cloud and between different cloud environments.

You can learn more about Google Compute Engine here. We’re going to pace ourselves and start with Google Compute Engine in limited preview (sign up here), but our goal is to give you all the pieces you need to build anything you want in the cloud. Whether you need a platform like Google App Engine, or virtual machines like Google Compute Engine, these days, you define your limits. We’re just at the start of what the cloud can do.

Posted by Navneet Joneja, Product Manager for Google Cloud Storage

Google Cloud Storage enables developers to store and access massive amounts of data on Google’s infrastructure with high reliability, availability and performance. Since Google Cloud Storage graduated from preview last year, many developers have tapped directly into Google’s storage capabilities.

We are also seeing lots of technology providers integrating Google Cloud Storage directly into their offerings. For example, several providers of enterprise storage solutions have integrated with Google Cloud Storage to make their products and services even better.

Here’s how a few of these companies are helping their customers build a bridge to the cloud with Google Cloud Storage:

• Panzura allows globally distributed enterprises to store, collaborate and backup files in the cloud using Panzura File System and Google Cloud Storage.
• StorSimple offers a single integrated appliance for primary storage, data protection and disaster recovery. Now, you can connect your StorSimple appliances to the cloud with Google Cloud Storage.
• TwinStrata’s storage gateway can now be used in conjunction with Google Cloud Storage for data storage, backup and disaster recovery in the cloud.
• Zmanda provides backup and disaster recovery solutions for businesses. You can now use Zmanda’s software to backup your on-premise data to Google Cloud Storage.
• Gladinet makes it easy to upload a file from your desktop to Google Cloud Storage, share it with your team and manage access controls using a web-based interface.

I'm thrilled to see other companies building innovative products using Google Cloud Storage. Today, we're also announcing lower storage prices to make it even more affordable to store your data in Google's cloud. The new pricing will be effective retroactively from March 1st, 2012.

If you’re interested in learning how you can tap into Google’s cloud storage capabilities to serve your company’s storage needs, we’d love to have a conversation or you can get started online.

Posted by Patrick Ryan, Policy Counsel, Open Internet

Last year, we were excited about the effort initiated by the U.S. government to promote cloud adoption through the Cloud First initiative. Through this initiative, the federal government declared that taxpayers' money should be used in a more productive way, and having the government run its own data centers (more than 2,000 of them) didn't make sense. They’ve targeted the shutdown of more than 1,000 in what they call their “year of change in federal IT,” saving more than $2 billion in taxpayer money. Through leading by example, the federal government went Google with several large agencies including the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the Government Services Agency (GSA). They join other public entities like the states of Wyoming, and Utah, Washington DC, and the cities of Orlando and Pittsburgh. Also, quasi-public entities have embraced Google Apps, including more than 61 of the top 100 U.S. universities.

In 2012, we hope to see the same movement in Europe. On January 26th, the European Commission's Vice President Neelie Kroes announced at the World Economic Forum in Davos the European Cloud Partnership, and they're backing it with an investment of 10 million EUR to create "a strong common basis for cloud procurement by public authorities." Commissioner Kroes also addressed many of the concerns about local clouds in a decisive way:

“There is one thing that does not make sense and I want to be clear about it: The Cloud Partnership, and indeed our overall Cloud Computing strategy, is not about building a European super-cloud, neither outright nor by forcing the integration of existing public cloud infrastructures. Cloud business models, and the set-up of cloud suppliers' and publicly-run data centres, should be determined by efficiency considerations on the market.”

We believe that the European Cloud Partnership will be a positive thing for public authorities, not just in Europe, but around the world. According to recent studies, the Internet already accounts on average for 3.4% of GDP in a group of 13 emerging and developed economies, helps to spur economic growth and initiatives like this will help to promote its positive economic impact further.

Posted by Dylan Lorimer, Google Earth and Maps for Business Product Manager

Since 2008, Google has worked with GeoEye to publish millions of square kilometers of satellite imagery to Google Earth and Maps users. In addition to the imagery the company shares with Google, GeoEye also collects satellite imagery for licensing by numerous governments and business customers around the world.

Google Earth Builder is designed to make it easy for a geospatial data provider to securely publish its data to specific users or developers. For example, during a crisis response effort such as a forest fire, a government agency might need a particular group of employees to be able to access recent satellite images of the forest on their tablets or smartphones in real time.

Today we’re delighted to announce that GeoEye is the first commercial satellite imagery provider to adopt the Google Earth Builder platform. By using Google Earth Builder, GeoEye will rely on Google's cloud infrastructure to process, host, and securely publish their satellite imagery and mapping layers. Doing so will make it easy for their customers to access GeoEye’s geospatial data from their computers, tablets and other internet-connected devices.

This also means GeoEye will be able to create new business models around hosted, subscription access to their data, and will be able to provide Google Enterprise customers with the option to license additional imagery from GeoEye for use within Google Maps, Google Earth and APIs.

We’re really excited to have GeoEye using Google Earth Builder and looking forward to them publishing a host of new subscription imagery layers to our Google Enterprise Maps and Earth customers. Learn more about GeoEye’s plans to create subscription imagery services with Google Earth Builder here.

Posted by Rahul Sood, Global Head of Enterprise Partnerships

Today, we’re making it easier for larger businesses to use Google’s cloud services by announcing the Cloud Transformation Program.

With the Cloud Transformation Program, we’ve identified select Google partners that can help you get the most out of Google’s cloud services, including Google App Engine, Google Storage for Developers, Google Apps Script and Google Prediction API. Initially, Cloud Transformation Program partners will offer customized solutions in the following areas:

• Cloud-based applications such as websites, mobile apps, social media apps, business process apps and customer-facing web apps built using Google App Engine and Google Apps Script
• Predictive solutions such as fraud detection, customer sentiment analysis, and customer churn prediction built using Google Prediction API
• Enterprise storage solutions such as storage for applications, data sharing and high-reliability backup built using Google Storage for Developers

Over time, we expect that partners will expand their focus as we add new cloud services.

We’re excited to have CSC, Cloud Sherpas, Cognizant, Opera Solutions, Razorfish, SADA Systems and TempusNova as our initial Cloud Transformation Program partners. These partners all have deep expertise and a proven track record of success helping businesses make the most of their IT investments, so we appreciate their support. To learn how you can use Google’s cloud services in your business, please contact one of our partners directly.

Posted by Marco Pancini, Senior Policy Counsel, Europe

In May, the European Commission launched a Public Consultation on cloud computing to collect stakeholders’ input on opportunities and barriers to the adoption of cloud computing. Ms. Neelie Kroes, the Vice President of the European Commission and European Digital Agenda Commissioner, summarised Europe’s ambition quite well when she declared in a recent speech, that “the goal is to make Europe not just cloud-friendly but also cloud-active.”

At Google, we fully support the European Commission’s efforts in this area. Cloud computing is gaining traction in Europe and elsewhere. The cloud saves users money and it creates jobs. According to a recent study from Professor Federico Etro of the University of Venice, cloud computing in the EU will contribute 0.4% of GDP and create a million jobs by 2016. Similarly, in the United States Vivek Kundra, previously the Obama administration’s Chief Information Officer, recently pointed out in the New York Times that U.S. government agencies can gain significant economic benefits by moving their IT services to the cloud. And, as we said in July, the United States has reached out to industry for input. We’re thrilled that governments in Europe and the United States are so enthusiastic about cloud computing.

For these reasons, Google has submitted its contribution to this important debate in Europe. In particular, we have provided our point of view on what we consider key issues, namely:

• The legislative framework: We suggest proposals to facilitate cloud adoption and to remove the legislative and administrative barriers service providers are facing in Europe, and still preserve consumer values and data protection.
• Embracing interoperability and data portability: Google has put a lot of effort into tools and solutions aimed at giving users control over their data in the cloud and making data genuinely portable.
• Public sector clouds: the public sector should lead by example in important fields like security and procurement, at the EU, national and local levels (similar to the “Cloud First” strategy in the United States).
• Global solutions for global problems: one of the advantages of the cloud is scalability, which needs to be fostered by setting global standards, in particular in the areas of data protection and security.

At the end of the day, the European Commission has a great opportunity to come up with a proposal that modernizes the EU legislative framework and especially the EU data protection regime. The cloud offers the possibility to truly leverage the digital single market to the benefit of all Europeans, both users and providers, and we at Google hope our proposals will help the Commission take the right steps going forward.

Posted by Kevin Gough, Google Enterprise team

Google and salesforce.com share a similar vision for cloud computing and we’ve teamed up over the years on a number of joint initiatives, including integrations between AdWords, Google Apps, Google App Engine and Salesforce offerings. This week, salesforce.com is hosting their Dreamforce cloud computing industry event, and we’re happy to be one of the sponsors.

If you’re going to be at Dreamforce this year, come get an update on Google’s products and cloud vision in one of our conference sessions.

And if you’re in the Bay Area during the conference (8/30 - 9/2), but haven’t yet registered for it, good news, the Dreamforce keynotes, super sessions and the expo sessions are now free, so consider registering and coming on by.

Google sessions to attend

Super Session: 3 Million Google Apps Customers: Strategies for Mobile & Social at Work
Date: Thur, 9/1, 2:45 - 3:45 pm
Location: Yerba Buena Center for the Arts - Novellus Theater
See Google products in action, including new mobile and social tools, and hear our customers share their successes and what they’ve learned during cloud adoption. If you're one of a lucky few, you may also walk away with a new Chromebook.

Keynote: Eric Schmidt
Date: Thur, 9/1, 4:30 pm - 5:30 pm
Marc Benioff will hold a fireside chat with Eric Schmidt, Executive Chairman of Google, on topics ranging from the evolution of the social enterprise to technology policies necessary to stimulate economic growth.

Chromebooks for Business
Date: Wed, 8/31, 5:00 - 6:00 pm
Location: Moscone West - 3020
Hear how organizations are putting Chromebooks to use and see demos of new Chromebooks, included tools to manage Chromebooks across an organization, and features from our collaboration with Citrix.

Register for Google sessions on the Dreamforce agenda builder. Attendee login.

Expo

Come by booth #611 on the expo floor to try out our latest Chromebooks and ask questions of Google product specialists.

We hope to see you at Dreamforce!