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If you have heard about the cloud and you are wondering how it could benefit you, here’s a rundown of the industries and domains in which it’s making an impact. This should help you identify ways in which cloud technologies can improve your lived experience.
Business Services
Customer service teams are increasingly dependent on cloud tools to execute, monitor, and improve their operations. Customer Relationship Management (CRM) platforms are predominantly cloud-based. This allows the user to collect, store, analyze, and leverage vast amounts of customer data within the shortest possible time.Project Management
The cloud enables easy sharing and collaboration around projects. Platforms built on it will allow multiple team members to work on the same data sets at the same time, from wherever they are. It’s a feature that makes real-time project management easier. This applies whether you are using ready-made project management software, or working with different tools, like spreadsheets or plain documents.Art
Cloud computing can serve as the basis for creative applications. For example, certain well-known cloud software is used to design logos, brochures, business cards, branded wear, and other marketing material. There are also digital canvases and video-making platforms that leverage the cloud’s vast storage space to accommodate the numerous, heavy content that users create.Communication
All of the world’s famous social media platforms are built on the cloud. That’s because it has the space required to hold all the content produced by users on those platforms. Enterprise email and messaging can also be done over the cloud. IT companies can provide cloud support for internet-based voice calls (VoIP calls). Video conference call apps are cloud-dependent as well.Healthcare
Healthcare has been transformed by Hospital Management Systems. This software digitises entire aspects of the healthcare delivery process, from patient registration to diagnosis and prescription, as well as bed space and medical procurement. It places all of these on a single platform that’s accessible to authorized members of the hospital team. Because of the volume of data and the need for collaboration associated with healthcare delivery, Hospital Management Systems are typically cloud-based.Sign up for the Connect Nigeria daily newsletter
Financial Services
Security is a big concern in banking. It’s largely thanks to the cloud that many financial service providers are able to protect their customers’ data to the degree that they can. It allows them to create high-level encryption that’s difficult for ill-intentioned intruders to break. Larger banks need vast room to store their clients’ information as well. They get that with the cloud’s almost unlimited storage space.Education
Staff and student portals have become an essential part of educational institutions’ setup. Things like student profiles, staff data, examination results, and school fees information are often accessible through these platforms. Libraries and resource centres have gone digital as well. In many cases, universities and secondary schools ask IT service providers to build cloud-based systems that support such information portals.Legal
Rather than store client and case information in physical files, law firms can choose to hold such data on dedicated cloud systems. This saves them a lot of space, makes information more accessible (files can be retrieved at the click of a button), and cuts the time and financial costs associated with physical storage. It’s also less likely that files will go missing or fall into the wrong hands.Government
The government has not been left out of the cloud technology revolution. As Ministries, departments, and Agencies digitize their databases, they rely on cloud service providers to enable their move to the cloud. Public sector organizations are particularly cautious about keeping their data within the country’s borders. Data sovereignty requirements mean that these organizations host their data with local data centres.Retail
The cloud makes high-efficiency inventory management possible. Inventory management software helps retailers retain their stock of goods at levels that aren’t too high or too low. Each product can be identified by batches, and information about them (and their availability) accessed and adjusted over the cloud platform.Manufacturing
A broad swathe of the manufacturing process can be improved by cloud technology. Whether it’s quality control specifications, product information sharing, tracking and tracing along the production line, or scaling the entire process faster, cloud tools come in handy for today’s largely automated manufacturing facilities.Register to attend the CN Business Mixer
Entertainment
Cloud gaming, or Gaming as a Service, is becoming a fixture in the contemporary entertainment space. This incarnation of online gaming lets you play games from the cloud. It works with a model similar to video-on-demand services—another type of platform that’s enabled by the cloud.Final Words
This article has noted just a few of the many applications that exist for cloud technology today. There are numerous others; so many that they extend to ever greater portions of our lives. Featured Image Source: Dynamix SolutionsGot a suggestion? Contact us: editor@connectnigeria.com
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