With the Internet as the backbone of delivery, innovative cloud-based services have revolutionised the lives of billions of people and hundreds of millions of businesses.
This is no small feat for a technology infrastructure that was in its infancy 20 years ago and an area of innovation that was all but declared dead after the "Internet bubble" burst in the US market 13 years ago. However the ability to easily access an amazing amount of computing power from nearly anywhere has proved to be a persistent driver of great ideas and business models.
Take video chat as an example - it's now quite practical to conduct interviews and
meetings across multiple timezones and continents. At Evernote we've started using
these for media briefings when we can't be there in person - this morning we conducted a briefing with journalists in 4 different countries in Latin America. There will never be a lack of need for in-person gatherings, but the instant productivity boost that you can get by adding a video component to some meetings is typically just a few clicks away - often for free.
In fact, without the power and reach of the cloud, Evernote itself wouldn't be possible. We operate a large number of dedicated servers optimised exactly for our needs, accessible from anywhere, and we can iterate rapidly on the Evernote service to address issues or add new features. Apps on every major platform connect to our
service infrastructure from anywhere - everything that Evernote users want to remember and make use of is now accessible everywhere, on every device, because of the cloud.
So as a consumer, what does the landscape look like and how has the cloud changed your ability to leverage technological innovations?
It's an amazing time to be a consumer of cloud services. Every day we get more for less - more storage from your email provider, more and higher quality picture storage from your photo sharing service, more features from your name-your-product provider... The pace of change and innovation continues to accelerate, and small and medium sized businesses are disproportionate winners in this marketplace. We are able to quickly adopt new services, change providers without excessive legacy baggage, and get the attention of the right people when we want to provide feedback. All of this creates a marketplace where competition is highly encouraged and the best services are rewarded with the loyalty of millions.
The creation of Evernote Business is the perfect example of this. Evernote is used by over 50 million people worldwide and we created Evernote Business for small and
medium sized businesses - like ourselves - to extend the benefits of using Evernote into a business setting.
Your knowledge makes everyone smarter - access by all of your employees, on all of their devices, to the important knowledge that's constantly collected in the business makes you a smarter, more nimble, more proactive business. It helps you be successful. So instead of investing in on-premise infrastructure and all of the attendant maintenance expenses associated with that, as a small or medium sized business, focus and invest in the critical factors that determine your success. What is it that makes you uniquely capable of innovating, of creating a better service or product than anyone else?
There are a myriad of solutions waiting to help you, all just a few clicks away.