Tech 10: Must-See Cloud Solutions Transforming Business

Cream Of The Crop

In its third annual State of the Cloud Survey, researcher RightScale reported in February that 94 percent of the 1,068 respondents are using the cloud in some way. Of these companies -- 24 percent of which have 1,000 or more employees -- 87 percent are using the public cloud and 58 percent are using both public and private clouds. To that end, here's a look at 10 of the newest and most prominent cloud-based solutions available today.

10. Broadview OfficeSuite PrivateCloud

Why suffer the expense of a physical data center when it can be constructed virtually? That's a question that might be asked rhetorically by Broadview and its OfficeSuite Private Cloud, a service that will construct and host a VMware-based hardware- and/or software-based data center with redundancy for a fraction of the on-premise cost. What's different about Broadview's solution, says the company, is that customers receive admin-level access and control over all physical assets, including servers, storage, gateways and appliances along with IOps performance guarantees.

9. Equinix Cloud Exchange

Why settle for just one cloud when you can access them all? That's what Equinix Cloud Exchange makes possible, and it does so without that pesky Internet. The Equinix Cloud Exchange is a private interconnection solution that enables seamless, direct access to multiple clouds and networks in any region of the world on demand. Whenever it's needed, a virtualized, secure connection is established through a single physical port. It's available in 18 major markets with APIs that include AWS and Azure.

8. dinCloud webHVD

Testing the limits of Chrome and its HTML5 rendering engine is dinCloud webHVD, a clientless Web application extension and back end that permits the provisioning and execution of Windows-based desktops that render through the browser. Desktops provide multilevel authentication, can integrate with Microsoft Active Directory and support resolutions of up to 2,560 x 1,600. Admins have access to a virtual private data center for managing security, SDN, virtualized storage and compute power.

7. BitTitan MigrationWiz

Migrating software across hardware platforms is rarely easy. Using the cloud to simplify the job is BitTitan MigrationWiz, which automates migration of email, private and shared folders and other data without the need for a local client utility in most cases. A simple conduit tool connects source and destination systems and data is moved seamlessly from one system to the other through BitTitan's secure server farm. Data is encrypted while in transit but remains available throughout the process.

6. Actifio Sky

As big data gets bigger, large companies require enterprise-class solutions to manage it. Intended to fill that need is Actifio Sky, which simplifies management of data sets that it gathers, analyzes and protects. This solution employs an efficient data movement protocol that optimizes bandwidth usage by transferring changed data to remote data stores. This reduces network usage by 70 percent, according to claims, and accelerates time to capture.

5. 2X Remote Application Server

One way to run Windows apps from a mobile device is to hope there's a version of the app for Android or iOS. Another is to get 2X Remote Application Server, which delivers Windows applications to any user anywhere, regardless of their device. The solution delivers applications, data and virtual desktops via the cloud from a central location hosted by 2X. The channel-friendly company promises continuous availability, resource-based load-balancing and total network transparency. And since it executes apps remotely over a secure connection, corporate data never leaves the data center.

4. Mimecast Services For Microsoft Office 365

Once the decision is made to migrate from on-premise Exchange servers to the cloud, Mimecast Services for Office 365 can help. The free tool can safely move an organization's email accounts and documents from a physical server to Mimecast's cloud service while preserving links to Microsoft's cloud-based Office suite.

3. Voxox Cloud Phone

Designed for the business with one to 10 employees is Voxox Cloud Phone, a cloud-based PBX that can route self-chosen local or toll-free numbers to any landline or mobile phone or to professionally recorded IVR system. Calls also can be routed to multiple phones and voicemails delivered as audio or text to email.

2. Piston OpenStack

In just four short years, OpenStack has risen like the rockets its founders at NASA send skyward. Launching in its own trajectory is Piston OpenStack, which automates the creation and deployment of an entire private cloud environment onto x86 servers with little or no operations support. Piston claims that its new product can go from bare-metal to a fully operational OpenStack-based private cloud with compute, storage and networking in less than a day and requires no other software or per-server installation.

1. Oracle Virtual Compute Appliance

The Oracle Virtual Compute Appliance enables rapid deployment of any x86 application or workload to its off-the-shelf software-defined infrastructure. According to the company, the system permits solution providers or IT administrators to "go from power on to production in about one hour and deploy ready-to-run virtual machines" for Linux, Oracle Solaris or Windows applications in just a few minutes.