Last month, I was honored to join a panel at CloudBeat in San Francisco, alongside other mobile industry executives, Andy McLoughlin from Huddle, Nick Mehta from LiveOffice and Vineet Jain from Egnyte. Hosted by VentureBeat, CloudBeat is a newer industry event that focuses on disruptive technologies across all sectors of the cloud. Their goal is to ‘uncover the solutions that are changing the way businesses serve customers and empower employees’.

The panel I joined focused mainly on the adoption of cloud in the mobile sector, and more specifically on iPads in the enterprise. We discussed Apple’s growing deployment within businesses and, as I mentioned during the panel, how they’re killing it without even trying. I believe the uptake in mobile computing devices among enterprises is due in part to the fact that executives and employees can take notes easily in meetings, revise important information on the go, upload it seamlessly to the cloud and access it later at their convenience. This emerging ‘cloud commuting’ trend is made possible by two components: tablets and apps. One cannot exist without the other. Apps and services like Quickoffice, LiveOffice, Huddle and Egnyte help users unlock the processing power and portability of tablets to complete various work and entertainment functions.

Beyond our specific panel, I noticed other emerging trends at the event, including the hybrid public-and-private cloud. Small companies that were early adopters of cloud technology have now grown and require additional security and support. This is leading to organizations leveraging a combination of public and private cloud services to meet their needs. Another trend that is particularly close to my heart is the opportunity the cloud is creating for smaller players. Companies realize that it may be more profitable and efficient to purchase less robust products, which offer more specialized functionality, since older software frequently comes packed with complex features that half their users never use. For example, organizations that increasingly shift to tablets may find that Microsoft Office licenses aren’t necessary for all users, and opt for a lightweight, mobile-designed app like Quickoffice to meet their document needs.

This was my inaugural year at CloudBeat and I greatly enjoyed the overall feel of the conference, as well as meeting with other industry players to discuss the evolving cloud ecosystem. I’d love to hear your thoughts about where you see the mobile cloud market heading.