cloudTP is unveiled! CTP Redux?

So let's put it right on the table.  This new company cloudTP has the initials CTP.  So does Cambridge Technology Partners.  And yes, pretty much all of the founders of cloudTP are Cambridge Technology Partners veterans.  After you get past both the silliness and the brilliance of this, you are going to have to pay attention.

This newly launched firm with $1,000,000 of seed money in the bank and a line of credit has a very simple premise.  Companies are going to want cloud computing, they are going to want it private, and they want to build it themselves.  It's complex, it's time consuming to build, and few IT departments have even figured out how to keep track of resource cost and charge back, much less create efficient automated self- provisioned compute models, while at the same time keeping legacy IT running.  With only about 30% of servers virtualized in the enterprise, do we really think private cloud will happen without TONS of consulting? Therefore, big companies are going to need help, and they will need to hire people to help.  It's that simple.

I like the pedigree in cloudTP.  It means something when people experienced in building real services companies step up into a major technology wave like cloud.  Real services guys, like guys from CTP, know methodology, they know business scalability, and they know how to sell and deliver big visionary things with multi-year contracts to the enterprise.  You might think that cloudTP will compete against the likes of Appirio and Blue Wolf, or even be the nemesis to cloud providers like AWS and Rackspace, but the real competition is going to be Accenture, CSC, EMC Consulting, IBM, and even McKinsey (yes I know that sounds stupid but McKinsey probably thinks they play here).  More so the vendor consulting arms and Global SIs though.

What cloudTP recognizes is that this is a multi-year IT Transformation play, nothing more and nothing less.  It will be fun to see how this plays out. From talking to these guys, they've got some big deals in the bag or lined up, so they will start hitting the radar screens of technology providers and cloud services providers, who will be wondering-who are these guys crawling all around my customer site talking about building private clouds?

You can read Jeff's other blog entries at Speed & Change--The Business of IT Services.