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TACKLING the recession head on with innovation is at the heart of a new business initiative centred around Gorey Community School.

Gorey CS students at the launch of Innovate School Business Awards with sponsor Jim Hughes of Innovate, teachers Catherine Skelton and Lisa Nangle and Pamela Hughes, Gorey Chamber.

The Innovate School Business Awards were launched last week with the aim of stimulating enterprise, and encouraging entrepreneurial activity in young people. The awards are a joint venture between Gorey Community School, Innovate, and Gorey Chamber. Working with the Transition Year students, the programme centres on recession busters and sustainability. Over 35 students, coordinated by TY teachers Lisa Nangle and Emma Hamilton, were briefed last week on the programme sponsored by Innovate. ‘We believe in supporting our community and in encouraging our young people in a way that will benefit our economy,’ said Jim Hughes of Innovate. ‘ This is our first venture in this area and we are delighted to work with Gorey Community School and Gorey Chamber.’ The full list of Mentors includes: John Dempsey of Weatherglaze Systems; Niall Slattery, Director of Warren Estates; Finbarr O’donoghue, The Haven Group; and Jim Osborne, Developer of Gorey Business Park, who are all experienced professionals. They have willingly given their time to guide these ventures. John Dempsey said they are really excited about working with the students over the next few months. ‘ They have already impressed us with their ideas,’ he said. Dick White, CEO of Gorey Chamber said they are delighted to have such mentors on board. ‘We are delighted to be involved in such a Project. It encourages entrepreneurship and gives young people a real taste of business,’ he said. ‘We are particularly fortunate to have a strong panel of mentors to work with the students and their projects.’

Productivity: Microsoft Office 365 – Give everyone familiar Microsoft Office collaboration and productivity tools delivered through the cloud. Everyone can work together easily with anywhere access to email, web conferencing, documents, and calendars.

Cloud Platform: Windows Azure – an open and flexible cloud platform that enables you to quickly build, deploy and manage applications across a global network of Microsoft-managed datacenters. You can build applications using any language, tool or framework. And you can integrate your public cloud applications with your existing IT environment.

Private Cloud: Windows Server Hyper-V and Microsoft System Center – the private cloud gives you the flexibility and control to set your own course. Pool computing resources, automate management, and improve scalability, provisioning, and agility.

Business Insights: Microsoft Dynamics – Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online equips your business professionals with anywhere access to customer information through an easy-to-use Microsoft Outlook experience that delivers enhanced collaboration and real-time business insights.

Management and Security: Windows Intune – Windows Intune simplifies and helps you manage and secure PCs using Windows cloud services and Windows 7. This means your computers and users can operate at peak performance from virtually anywhere.

If you are planning implementing a cloud solution Innovate is always available to advise and assist you.

CLOUD COMPUTING MODELS

A recent survey referred to in the Irish media indicates that many Irish businesses remain confused by the term cloud computing. The United States NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology) defined cloud computing terms as follows:

Service Models:

• Cloud Software as a Service (SaaS). The capability provided to the consumer is to use the provider’s applications running on a cloud infrastructure. The applications are accessible from various client devices through a thin client interface such as a web browser (e.g., web-based email). The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloud infrastructure including network, servers, operating systems, storage, or even individual application capabilities, with the possible exception of limited user-specific application configuration settings.

• Cloud Platform as a Service (PaaS). The capability provided to the consumer is to deploy onto the cloud infrastructure consumer-created or acquired applications created using programming languages and tools supported by the provider. The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloud infrastructure including network, servers, operating systems, or storage, but has control over the deployed applications and possibly application hosting environment configurations.

• Cloud Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). The capability provided to the consumer is to provision processing, storage, networks, and other fundamental computing resources where the consumer is able to deploy and run arbitrary software, which can include operating systems and applications. The consumer does not manage or control the underlying cloud infrastructure but has control over operating systems, storage, deployed applications, and possibly limited control of select networking components (e.g., host firewalls).

Deployment Models:

• Private cloud. The cloud infrastructure is operated solely for an organization. It may be managed by the organization or a third party and may exist on premise or off premise.

• Community cloud. The cloud infrastructure is shared by several organizations and supports a specific community that has shared concerns (e.g., mission, security requirements, policy, and compliance considerations). It may be managed by the organizations or a third party and may exist on premise or off premise.

• Public cloud. The cloud infrastructure is made available to the general public or a large industry group and is owned by an organization selling cloud services.

• Hybrid cloud. The cloud infrastructure is a composition of two or more clouds (private, community, or public) that remain unique entities but are bound together by standardized or proprietary technology that enables data and application portability (e.g., cloud bursting for load balancing between clouds).
Innovate have completed a number of engagements with Irish and International companies utilising cloud technologies and services, from vendors including VMWare, Microsoft, Google and Amazon. If your business needs assistance or advise on how to integrate cloud services such as Microsoft Azure, Google App Engine, VMWare vCloud or Amazon EC2, Innovate is a position to assist.
The complete NIST document can be found at http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/drafts/800-145/Draft-SP-800-145_cloud-definition.pdf