Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
• The transformation of the existing scattered IT infrastructure into a Grid alone
is not sufficient. In most cases, considerable investments need to be made for
adjusting existing applications, i.e. Grid-enabling existing applications so that
they can run on a Grid infrastructure.
• Lack of standards for Grid Computing makes investments decisions for Grid
technology difficult and risky.
• Grid Computing is a complex technology affecting the complete IT infrastruc-
ture of a company. Thus, the introduction of Grid Computing in a company
is typically a long-term project and requires time until first results are visible.
The introduction of Grid Computing might require standardization of physical
resources. Even though Grids should inherently be able to deal with hetero-
geneity of available resources, higher heterogeneity of resources may require
higher investments in terms of time and money and thus increase the risk of
failure.
The opportunities resulting from Grids and the risks and challenges associated with
it need to be carefully compared and assessed in each particular case.
It is important to consider that Grid Computing is not only changing the IT infra-
structure in a company, but has the potential to provide significant business value.
As mentioned in chapter 1, increased agility, i.e. an organisation's increased ability
to respond and adjust quickly and efficiently to external market stimuli, is consid-
ered a key success factor for companies today. Existing IT infrastructure is consid-
ered to be a major obstacle to company agility. Prevailing IT infrastructure reflects
the inflexible built-to-order structure: thousands of application silos, each with its
own custom-configured hardware, and diverse and often incompatible assets that
greatly limit a company's flexibility and thus reduce time to market (Kaplan et
al. 2004). According to NESSI-Grid (2006) and Boden (2004), what is therefore
needed is an architecture that, in a similar way as the electricity grid, decouples
the means of supporting the day-to-day operations of users from the underlying
functional infrastructure that underpins them. This would also allow the business to
reconfigure its operational strategy without necessarily amending its underlying IT
systems. With the functionality described above, Grid Computing has the potential
to provide the decoupling layer in companies.
In conclusion, the biggest benefit of Grids is the increased potential for
companies to achieve new levels of innovation capabilities that can differentiate
their business from competitors. Grid Computing enables implementing of new
business processes and applications that companies would not be able to implement
by using conventional information technology. Grid provides a virtual, resilient,
responsive, flexible and cost effective infrastructure that fosters innovation and
collaboration.
