A basic screen grab of the interactive Cloud Hosting Blueprint graphic on the Parallels website.
(WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) — Web hosting and cloud software provider Parallels (www.parallels.com) announced on Thursday that it has launched its free Cloud Service Provider Blueprint – a kind of theoretical map of cloud hosting services, and a collection of directions and best practices for service providers on how to best offer cloud services – accompanied a free white paper.
Located on the Parallels website, the Cloud Hosting Blueprint includes an interactive graphic that lays out the company’s vision for cloud services – how it sees them as being divided, and what systems it considers critical to supporting them.
The accompanying white paper is a hefty 22-page document, filled with insight into the cloud hosting business model and aimed at smaller hosting providers – it understandably seems intended for the kind of Parallels partner that might look to the company for this kind of guidance.
In principle, it seems a somewhat similar effort to Microsoft’s Dynamic Data Center Toolkit, a collection of documentation that attempts to lay best practices for service providers in using Microsoft technology to operate their data centers.
The Parallels white paper, however, seems pretty clean of direct references to Parallels product. It’s more like an exercise in “thought leadership,” branded with the Parallels name. It’s left to the readers to draw the connection between the requirements outlined in the document and the company’s offerings.
That connection, while not completely explicit, is made relatively clear.
“A complete cloud service delivery platform must be purpose-built for the cloud,” reads part of the conclusion, “with the goal of providing the full set of services and a seamless user experience for the entire service lifecycle, from ordering to consuming to de-provisioning. Given the innate complexity of cloud services, this is the only way to ensure profitability.”
Downloading the PDF whitepaper from the cloud blueprint page on the Parallels website does require a registration, so it may also be a means of directly generating leads that way.
“The cloud is having a major impact on IT, prompting service providers of all categories to adapt their strategies to deliver services in the cloud,” says Jack Zubarev, president of marketing alliances at Parallels, quoted in the press release. “However, there has been little discussion about what it takes to launch these services quickly and deliver them profitably, and that remains a significant challenge within the industry. Our Cloud Service Provider Blueprint is the industry roadmap for how to gain a time-to-market edge in a highly competitive segment, and how to architect for profitability.”
About Liam Eagle
Liam Eagle has worked as a contributor to the Web Host Industry Review since its inception in 2000, and as editor since 2003. He has been editor of the WHIR's print magazine since its launch. His daily involvement in the gathering and reporting of Web hosting news and his regular interaction with Web hosting leaders gives him an uncommonly broad appreciation of the issues and tends facing the business. Through his WHIR blog, Liam spots Web hosting trends and offers opinions on the industry-wide impacts of major developments and the motivation behind big announcements. Follow him on Twitter @liameagle
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