Discussion Panel: Cloud Computing and Entrepreneurship [LIVE BLOG]

This post is a part of our coverage of Startups in Asia (Singapore), Penn Olson’s first tech conference. Our full coverage of the event can be found here, for our RSS feed, click here.

Summary

Serkan Toto is the moderator, talking to Francis Lee (Joyent), Zane Adam (Microsoft Azure), Christopher Bousigues (Nubefy), and Simone Brunozzi (Amazon Web Services) about web services and startups.

Liveblog

#15:01: And that’s a wrap!

#14:57: Lots of very technical stuff in this chat which is really fascinating but going way too fast and deep to liveblog. Hopefully the startups present at the event are taking notes…

#14:54: Simone says that lean startups can make use of the cloud to test out upgrades, such as with rolling out a new version of its software to only half of its customers, and then quickly roll back if there are issues. Amazon does it itself, he says, with a software update being implemented on its own servers every 11 seconds. Whoa!

#14:51: Large companies can now act like a startup, and the cloud is part of that, says Zane, thinking of Samsung’s SmartTV and that being a bew platform where startups are jumping on Microsoft’s Azure to power those.

#14:47: How about startups in Asia? Zane says that Asian startups are adopting cloud platforms really quickly, and cites the example of a startup using his Azure solution to power its Mobage (DeNA) platform game.

Simone, from Amazon, says that Asia is “one of the hottest markets.” Francis says that companies are now seeing the sense in the cloud, and the cost benefits of it, giving you savings that are tangible and allowing startups to scale their growth very exactly.

#14:41: “Just sign on and try,” encourages Christopher, as it doesn’t involve a lay out. “Try all of them,” he says, and listen to feedback from other users.

Francis says that entrepreneurs should look at very specialised features, such as node.js and how the providers runs that kind of thing.

#14:36: The Microsoft guy, Zane, says that a huge amount of layers of defenses need to be put up. Christopher points out that startups need to think of their very specific needs, and project into the future. For example, will a certain cloud provider allow you to expand into APAC with ease?