Technology is changing quickly and businesses are seeing a wide variety of options replacing traditional IT methodology that is driving change and productivity to businesses of all sizes. It's getting easier to take work with you with mobile devices and hosted services, but are these just expensive new toys or do they provide serious benefits to businesses?

Cloud Computing

Probably the biggest, vaguest buzz word of this technology generation, cloud computing can mean a whole lot of different things. From a technical standpoint, one definition of cloud computing is the infrastructure required to split computing power between a mass of devices, although there are publicly available clouds like Google and Amazon, private clouds that larger businesses establish, and even social networks and a slew of various web apps have been considered 'the cloud.'

Okay, so cloud computing is a big, ambiguous thing. However, leveraging the idea of the cloud offers cost-saving benefits to small businesses. Dropping the semantics, when a company doesn't need to worry about managing a part of their IT infrastructure in house, they save money. It's that simple. Let somebody else take care of it and make sure it works. Sure, there is a cost to this, but without the need for new hardware, space, electricity, heat disbursement, maintenance, and all of the other things that get tacked on with a best-practices server room, eliminating some of the hardware quickly adds up to big savings.

Mobile Devices

About half of all cell phone users own a smart phone. We might not have flying cars yet but we do have access to powerful handheld computing devices that keep us connected to both our personal and professional lives and give us the ability to work seamlessly from anywhere. Partially, mobile computing is related to cloud - the mobile platform is still fairly light weight and requires something else to do the heavy lifting and store the data. Still, businesses will be seeing a shift from traditional chained-down desktops to functional, accessible tablets, laptops, and smartphones, that is, if they haven't already.

The biggest improvement seen by adopting mobile technology is productivity. Users can access files and applications from anywhere, communicate and correspond easily from their mobile device, and stay productive while on the road. For most small businesses, employees might bring their own smartphone, but mobility is not going to be a fad. Business application developers are feeling the push and developing software that plays nice with tablets and smartphones. Eventually, this shift could lead to the eventual death of the desktop workstation as we know it for many types of employees, but harbor new and innovated ways small businesses get things done.

Technology is always changing and can drive businesses forward when adopted carefully - whether you want to save money or improve your bottom line's productivity or just provide better, more accessible options for your employees, BrightWire Networks can partner with your Olympia and Tacoma business and help prepare your company for the technology benefits of tomorrow.