4 remarkable ways companies are using the cloud

1. Scalable document management in the cloud

It’s probably been a few years since your company transferred over from paper files to electronic, but are all your documents in the cloud? When you use a scalable cloud computing solution for electronic document management, employees can access documents from anywhere.

This is a great solution for businesses that have multiple locations across the globe, teams in the field, or employees who work from home or while traveling. Scalable solutions have options for both small and large businesses and will make it easy to upgrade to more storage when the time is right. They will also have permissions control to make collaborating on documents easy.

One construction company, Balfour Beatty, decided to change from a traditional file storage solution to the cloud. This had positive results including lower costs and better adherence to deadlines due to greater communication between the corporate offices and construction teams out in the field.

2. Affordable heating with cloud services

A radical new technology actually uses the cloud to use the heat generated by a computer inside of their heating units to heat your space. They sell computer space and time to companies that need a lot of power including video processing and graphics firms.

Those who use the heaters actually pay nothing for the heating costs, though they do have to pay for the heater. The businesses who need computing power pay for the actual power used. This could save a lot of money on overhead over time, especially in colder places with typically high heating costs. In most cases, the heat from computing just gets wasted, but this idea puts it to good use.

Large companies like Google have been using this technology for a while, but this new idea brings it to the consumer level.

3. Cloud-based machine learning

There are several services that now offer cloud-based machine learning technology. Artificial intelligence is used a lot more often than you might think, and it’s more than just robots emulating human-like activity.

Examples of what can be done with this type of innovation include the ability to search videos and images, speech recognition and synthesis, or something as simple as creating a smart inbox that knows what e-mails you likely need to read. Because cloud computing creates easy digital storage, smart neural networks can learn from as much information as you can provide them.

4. Keep top talent with remote cloud capabilities

If a trusted and treasured employee moves away, you don’t have to say goodbye. Using the cloud, you can keep top talent and widen your hiring pool.

For example, the event management company, Event Pro-SSSS, decided to use cloud computing solutions for a headquarters move to Florida from Maryland. Because of this, the move caused absolutely no downtime, and their employees could remain in Maryland if they wanted. This choice had the unintended side effect of allowing the company to hire just about anyone who seems perfect for the job, regardless of their physical location.