Cloud computing is disrupting traditional business models and processes and will ultimately transform many industries around the world. It is being used to speed up and reduce the costs of existing processes and companies that resist change will certainly be left behind. This is according to local telecoms provider Euphoria Telecom.

There has been a phenomenal uptake in cloud solutions and many companies have already moved elements of their IT into the cloud. They have also become accustomed to the idea of storing company data in the cloud, whether its salesforce, dropbox or freshdesk.

Euphoria Telecom CEO George Golding says migration to cloud telephony is also on the rise. “With the availability of agile and flexible technologies, it has become easier and cheaper than ever before to adopt business telephony in the cloud.” “To satisfy the new markets being created by the cloud, businesses can now leverage the cloud and get a bigger slice of the action. They will go from being constrained to certain geographies to having the ability to scale globally with significantly reduced overhead costs,” he says.

Instead of deploying on-site infrastructure to run their operations, businesses can access infrastructure as a service via managed service providers. It's immediately available and gives companies a huge advantage over slower competitors. Remote working is becoming more and more commonplace with the arrival of cloud technologies. Employees can now access company files and documents securely via the cloud, it makes working from home not only possible, but even profitable for most businesses.

Cloud is playing a vital role in ensuring employees are in constant contact, communication systems have revolutionised as the cloud allows new and more efficient forms of collaboration. Cloud is no longer a 'nice-to-have' but has become a critical part of any organisation's infrastructure. Cloud computing allows employees to access corporate systems and apps using their personal devices, without posing a risk to the on-site infrastructure. They tend to be more productive, more efficient, and willing to put in longer hours since they are able to benefit from the greater flexibility of working from home.

IT departments have also taken on a whole new look, many companies are outsourcing most of their IT support to a cloud vendor rather than staffing a full-blown IT team. Cloud enables companies to streamline their IT departments and allows the remaining IT staff to focus on more mission critical solutions.

Golding says with cloud computing, businesses never again have to worry about running out of data storage space. “It is much cheaper to increase cloud storage space than on-site server space.”

“As the cloud journey grows more maturity, one will begin to see the full potential to transform business models and working practices. The cloud applications available today are just the tip of the iceberg, as the technology matures further, unimaginable functionality and efficiency will be available in years to come,” he concludes.

For more information visit www.euphoria.co.za or email sales@euphoria.co.za or contact Euphoria Telecom on (087) 231 0500.