Technology is changing fast. In fact, when I revisit the prophecy of Moore who predicted that there would reach a time when technology would change every 18 months, I am tempted to suggest that Moore was wrong.
We have seen technology evolving and new concepts in ICT coming up before one can even say amen. Grid computing, convergence,on-demand computing, you name it. One such is cloud computing.
Cloud computing is not entirely new.It was already gaining considerable fame a few years back in the western countries. But what is it? As the name suggests, it is a way of availing resources, ICT resources, on demand.
Cloud computing is a new way of performing tasks and accessing resources over the internet without investing in new infrastructure, training personnel or outsourcing.
The definitions are varied but the concept is the same.
Kenya, as a developing country,is full of promise especially in information technology adoption. We have seen government efforts to promote usage of information technology, especially now that we seek to achieve our objectives for Vision 2030. One such gesture is the ICT bill which was published a while back. The bill seeks to enforce internet governance, protect Kenyan firms from cyber-exploitation, enforce security among others. With the adoption of this bill, Kenya will be a thriving haven for business opportunities. But is Kenya ready to adopt the concept of cloud computing? Let's explore cases unique to Kenya.
Data Governance
Company's like Google, Amazon.com or even Yahoo and Oracle can afford the technological infrastructure to ensure security of their data is protected. In the case of enterprise cloud computing, a lot of data exchange is involved. Not only that but also the fact that suddenly your sensitive data gets exposed . This exposure may sometimes end in places where it was not intended.
One case to guard against this is to ensure that our local ISP's have maximum security features to ensure that data is secured. The government's policy on internet governance also needs to clearly spell out procedures and techniques and ensure that these are enforced.
Reliability
Granted that services available in the cloud are reliable, the case may not hold for Kenya. It is a fact that heavy enterprise application demands cannot permit them to run on cloud servers. In the Kenyan context, the implication would be the financial cost of deploying this.
Internet bandwidth
Cloud servers need maximum and strong internet connection with reliable bandwidth to ensure maximum output. Sadly, this is not the case for Kenya.
The spread of internet access while increasing considerable, it still is not enough to help in making the decision to adopt on-demand computing concepts in Kenya.
The fiber optic cable was met with a lot optimism but a year down the line, any tangible gains is still to be registered.
There are several other cases that work against Kenya in the adoption of on-demand computing. This can be on a case-by-case basis or industry wide basis. Whatever the case, industry players , the government and scholars need to pull together to push Kenya to the next level of higher level computing.
What are your thoughts on this post?
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