Cloud computing: great growth potential
DIW Berlin Weekly Report 48 / 2010, pp. 10-16
Cloud computing describes a fundamental change in the field of information and communication technologies (ICT). Increasingly, software applications, but also hardware functions such as storage space and computing capacity are no longer sold for permanent use on a local computer, but are offered centrally via public or private computer networks and billed according to demand. Computer functions thus become services that can be used regardless of location and billed flexibly. The increasing spread of cloud computing is leading to changes at various levels of the national economy. From the point of view of individual companies, major savings potentials are opening up. In particular, the previously predominantly fixed costs for ICT applications are becoming increasingly variable, which also enables companies with comparatively little financial strength to use these systems more intensively. Significant growth effects can be expected in the economy as a whole. Within the ICT sector, the spread of cloud computing will lead to major upheavals in previous structures.