In the world of supply chains, signing on a new partner or trading partner has typically marked the beginning of a marathon. Whether by electronic data interchange, EDIFACT, cXML, ebXML, value added networks, portals or the rest of the alphabet soup of connectivity approaches, a great deal of time and effort is required to get trading partners’ systems aligned - even if trading hubs are involved. Every company has a different system, and different processes for getting things done. For a company with thousands of trading partners, imagine how much in resources it gobbles up just to manage and keep every partnership aligned. Of course, cloud changes all that right?

When is it better to use a public cloud versus a managed hosting or collocation environment? A recent case study finds that if an organization is spending more than $7,644 in Amazon’s cloud each month, then it can be cheaper to operate a private cloud.