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Yahoo and technology giants Intel and Hewlett Packard on Tuesday announced an alliance to advance "cloud computing," backing a trend that would reduce reliance on packaged software.
Earlier this year Google and IBM teamed up for the same purpose, to advance research into providing software as a service on the Internet hosted by data centers instead of requiring people to install programs on their computers.
Yahoo, HP and Intel have partnered with the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore and universities in the United States and Germany to create centers for collaborative research.
"Cloud computing is of critical importance to the industry," Intel Research director Andrew Chien said during a conference call with reporters.
"We really see this as a big challenge not only in terms of services provided from the cloud but technological challenges about what the shape of cloud computing should be."
A common example of cloud computing is web-based email offered by Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and other Internet operations. Google has expanded its online software offerings to include word documents, spread sheets and more.
"To realize the full potential of cloud computing, the technology industry must think about the cloud as a platform for creating new services and experiences," said HP Labs director Prith Banerjee.
"This requires an entirely new approach to the way we design, deploy and manage cloud infrastructure and services."
Results of research done at the centers will be made public to make it easier for software developers to craft applications for cloud computing.
"We believe this collaboration will do a great deal to take the research to the next level," Yahoo Research head Prabhakar Raghavan said during the conference call.
"We are really fueling the ecosystem here... Inevitably an application developer will build more readily for the cloud."
-- AFP
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