Public Cloud IaaS : A Price/Performance vs. Security Analysis

Leading Federal Integrators Address Tactical Cloud Computing

By G C Network | October 7, 2009

Yesterday during the first annual Government IT Conference and Expo, tactical cloud computing was cited as a critical component within this new paradigm. Joining me to address the issue were:…

Carpathia Creates Government Solutions Business Unit

By G C Network | October 6, 2009

In a strong statement of focus, Carpathia Hosting has announced the formation of Carpathia Government Solutions, a unit dedicated to providing solutions specifically for federal civilian and defense agencies. This…

INPUT FedFocus 2010

By G C Network | September 30, 2009

Please join me at the 7th Annual FedFocus Conference, November 5, 2009, at the Ritz Carlton in McLean, VA. This conference has been designed to provide crucial information on upcoming…

Dataline, Lockheed Martin, SAIC, Unisys on Tactical Cloud Computing

By G C Network | September 25, 2009

I’m proud to announce that representatives from Lockheed Martin, SAIC, and Unisys will join me in a Tactical Cloud Computing “Power Panel” at SYS-CON’s 1st Annual Government IT Conference &…

GSA, DoD and NCOIC to Collaborate on Government Cloud Computing

By G C Network | September 22, 2009

Yesterday, during the NCOIC Cloud Computing Workshop, collaboration seemed to be the focus as Katie Lewin, GSA Cloud Computing Initiative Program manager, and Dan Risacher, DoD Cloud Computing Storefront project…

FederalNewsRadio Highlights Government Cloud Computing

By G C Network | September 20, 2009

Last week’s Apps.gov announcement was the latest steps in the government’s “at the quick step” march into cloud computing. FederalNewsRadio, a Washington metro area media fixture, highlighted the event with…

NCOIC Officially Launches Cloud Computing Working Group

By G C Network | September 14, 2009

On Wednesday, 9 September 2009 the Network Centric Operations Industry Consortium (NCOIC) Technical Council formally approved the creation of a Cloud Computing Working Group (CCWG). Organizationally this new working group…

1 Billion Mobile Cloud Computing Subscribers !!

By G C Network | September 10, 2009

Yes. That’s what I said! A recent EDL Consulting article cites the rising popularity of smartphones and other advanced mobile devices as the driving force behind a skyrocketing mobile cloud…

NCOIC Holding Full-Day Cloud Computing Workshop

By G C Network | September 4, 2009

The Network Centric Operations Industry Consortium will be holding an all day Cloud Computing Workshop on September 21, 2009 in Fairfax, VA. Open to the public, this workshop will focus…

Pentagon Reviews Unisys Stealth

By G C Network | August 31, 2009

According to a Newtworkworld.com article, the United States Joint Forces Command (USJFC) is currently evaluating Unisys Stealth technology at the Joint Transformation Command for Intelligence (JTC-I) in Suffolk, Virginia. “Unisys…

Industry’s transition from custom made, one-of-a-kind IT infrastructures to the standardize, commodity based cloud paradigm is well on it’s way. IBM’s recent “Under Cloud Cover” study highlights the rapidly of this global transformation:

“According to our global study of more than 800 cloud decision makers and 
users, business leaders of all stripes – Finance, Sales & Marketing, Product 
Development and more – are becoming increasingly focused on the business value 
cloud provides. Over the next three years, cloud’s strategic importance to business 
users is expected to double from 34 percent to 72 percent, even surpassing their IT 
counterparts at 58 percent.”

From IBM “Under Cloud Cover”: Competitive advantages from 
cloud computing help leading organizations deliver stand-out
 financial performance . (Click to enlarge)
https://public.dhe.ibm.com/common/ssi/ecm/en/ciw03086usen/CIW03086USEN.PDF

What seems surprising, however, is that this shift is happening even in the face of repeated cautions and warnings about the security of public clouds.  The key challenge for decision makers is how to balance the business need to quickly transition to cloud with the equally important business need of maintaining information security and privacy.

Lucky for us, two recent public cloud reports from Gartner and Cloud Spectator have gone a long way toward addressing this critical question. Gartner’s “Toolkit: Comparison Matrix for Cloud Infrastructure as a Service Providers, 2013” provides a comparative scoring of the security and compliance capabilities of the Gartner Public IaaS Magic Quadrant companies while Cloud Spectator has recently provided a price/performance  scoring for the same group of companies. I’ve used this data to produce the Price/Performance vs Security chart below.

Click to enlarge

While this marketplace snapshot is definitely not definitive, this data should certainly help us all who are charged with managing this important transition.

( The Price-Performance score is a blend of technical performance obtained from Cloud Spectator and use case performance obtained from Gartner. In the chart, the higher the value on the vertical axis, the better. Security score was obtained from Gartner. The further to the right on the horizontal axis, the better. Since CSC was not included in Cloud Spectator’s performance analysis they are also not included in the chart provided above.)


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2 Comments

  1. Kenny Li on October 26, 2013 at 5:55 am

    Very interesting take on the two analyses, Kevin!

    Just out of curiosity, which price/performance values did you use from the Cloud Spectator report? The system performance?

    The information here is well-illustrated, and simplifies a range of concerns brought up in the cloud industry. Thanks for the post, and I look forward to seeing more information like this in the future.



  2. Kevin L. Jackson on October 29, 2013 at 10:48 pm

    Thanks. I just updated to post in order to clarify data origin. The Price-Performance score is a blend of technical performance (CloudSpec Score) obtained from Cloud Spectator and use case performance obtained from Gartner. I then normalized the values using equal weight. In the chart, the higher the value on the vertical axis, the better. Security score was obtained from Gartner. The further to the right on the horizontal axis, the better.