Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Judy Spitz, CIO of Verizon (Part 8)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini

SM: Let’s explore these from an organizational standpoint. In your organization, in the business units or functional units that interface with the IT organization, what is their thinking on these kinds of cloud-related issues? What is the perspective of your CMO or your head of customer support? What is the thought leadership partnership within your organization on these kinds of topics? >>>

Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Judy Spitz, CIO of Verizon (Part 7)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini

SM: There is one thing I want to share related to what we discussed just now about social Web trends so that we can get the large enterprise perspective. Here is a scenario. We often have this experience: Right now our lives are so electronics-dependent right? Electronics-, equipment-, and gadgets-dependent, and I am sure that Verizon, being a telecom company, receives a ton of phone calls from customers on how to configure some of these pieces of equipment. Whether it is a router sitting in a small business office or a bunch of smart phones that you are hooking up to your customer base, whatever it is. There are a lot of customer technical support configuration calls, and at some level I feel that the social Web is a good place to tackle some of these calls. As an executive at a large enterprise, what are your thoughts on this trend? >>>

Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Judy Spitz, CIO of Verizon (Part 6)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini

SM: Given the strategy you have followed thus far, what have you been able to accomplish from a cost reduction point of view?

JS: Let me answer the question this way. Say in terms of applications that have flexible or volatile demand, which includes several of the ones I have mentioned, the cost structure is very favorable. I will add to that mix those applications that have a limited time demand. What I mean by that is an application that you might want to set up temporarily, or say you are prototyping or piloting, and you are bringing up the application for n number of weeks or months as opposed to applications that may stay up for years. Those are all proving to be significantly cheaper for us to run in a cloud environment. I’m not going to provide you with dollars and cents, and it wouldn’t [be] applicable, because again you have to understand that our cost structure is highly efficient. We have virtualized a lot of our data centers and applications, and we have probably some the best pricing on enterprise licensing agreements with software vendors as anyone. So, we have set the bar, and the bar is pretty high for a company like ours. There are others, financial institutions and such, that run these kinds of big environments, too. >>>

Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Judy Spitz, CIO of Verizon (Part 5)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini

SM: What applications have you moved to the cloud? You have described the principle of which applications you are moving. Would you give me examples of those that fit that model? >>>

1M/1M: Cloud Computing Module Of The Curriculum Is Ready

Entrepreneurs, the Cloud Computing module of the 1M/1M curriculum is also ready. In my opinion, this is an area that you can build some exciting companies in, and it is also possible to bootstrap ventures. The module, as usual, contains video lectures and case studies, as well as a discussion of major trends and blue-sky opportunities.

You can access it on the 1M/1M site, here.

Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Judy Spitz, CIO of Verizon (Part 4)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini

JS: Well, here is an expression that I heard years and years ago. It seems so right to me that I repeat it many times. I think it is very relevant here; it is the expression is about consumer expectations today – the slowest speed I am willing to tolerate is the fastest speed I have ever experienced! >>>

Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Judy Spitz, CIO Of Verizon (Part 3)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini

JS: This applies regardless of whether I think about clouds in terms of internal operations or I think about them as I imagine other enterprises would think about cloud computing – meaning how we should position this to our customers. >>>

Thought Leaders In Cloud Computing: Judy Spitz, CIO Of Verizon (Part 2)

By Sramana Mitra and guest author Shaloo Shalini

SM: What is the scope of your IT organization at Verizon that services the enterprise business?

JS: By scope, do you mean the size or the things?

SM: Size or anything that gives us some idea of the scope of IT management at Verizon. >>>