Understanding Business Models on the Cloud

Abstract

The relationship between business models and cloud-based systems has not been explicitly discussed in the literature. In this chapter, the authors posit that the intersection between business models and cloud computing creates two distinctive technological paradigms: cloud computing as a business model which can be seen as the development of cloud computing driven business models' (hereafter CCBM) and cloud computing-enhanced or enabled business models which can be broadly thought of as improved business modelling with the help of cloud computing (hereafter BMCC). The former refers to a technological model or system that commercializes value solely created by cloud-based systems in public and private sectors whereas the latter refers to various ways that cloud-based systems are integrated into existing business models to enhance, improve, or enable creation and commercialization of new value. An explicit acknowledgement of these two trajectories and their underling architecture are remarkably absent in the literature. This chapter addresses this deficiency.