Cloud computing has attracted great attention from the government and the private sector. With Taiwan being a critical hardware production base in the global cloud computing industry, major Taiwan hardware firms have been engaged in the R&D of infrastructure as a service (IaaS) technology and the terminal technologies of smartphones and tablet PCs, leading to the formation of a complete cloud-computing supply chain. In practice, IaaS is still limited to the B2C field and related firms are still reluctant to apply it to B2B, due to the consideration of information safety, performance, customization, and conversion cost. Therefore, IaaS software developed by Taiwan firms is mostly meant for B2C applications and it will take a while for extension to the B2B market.
Development direction and opportunities of cloud computing
Lian Kun-jing, president of Trade-Van Information Service, believes that along with the maturity of services and increased trust of enterprises, could-computing business will gradually extend to B2B commercial service. It will start from the interface of information, with software development firms providing different integrated services via different platform and hardware. Software developers will develop various services using resources available on cloud-computing platform and provide users various mobile services via innovative mobile devices, thereby inducing the development of IaaS cloud-computing service. Meanwhile, via the collection and integration at the terminal end, platform operators can store and analyze massive amount of information at the cloud end, as the basis for the development of new services or improvement of existing services.
Development of B2C electronic government uniform invoice
Trade-Van is now developing the B2C cloud-computing service for electronic government uniform invoices. The service can allow software developers develop various value-added services on the platform, such as personalized wealth management, consumption record, and record of commodity prices. Electronic government uniform invoices can lead to energy conservation and carbon abatement, as well corporate cost reductions. Moreover, e-invoices, amounting to 8 billion pieces a year, contain rich information, for platform operators to generate various kinds of consumer information and carry out analysis of consumer behavior. The results can be used in the development of new services or conduct precision marketing for target consumer groups.
B2B trade and customs clearance service
Originally a customs-clearance network developer, Trade-VAN has developed three integrated industrial-chain cloud-computing services of customs clearance, circulation, and logistics. Instead of the involvement of various information systems and different government and private-sector units, customs-clearance cloud-computing platform can achieve the effect of a single documentary input and paperless trade, allowing for information sharing and cross-line alliance.
Role to be played by Trade-Van in cloud computing
As the largest B2B cloud-computing value-added service provider in Taiwan, Trade-Van has served various government agencies and private-sector enterprises. Its services include central office and call center operating around the clock, complete and professional SOC information security, and over 50 IaaS professional services for 49,000 clients. To pave the way for its development in cloud-computing, Trade-Van invested over NT$1 billion (US$34 million) in the installation of third-generation computer systems, capable of meeting the need for developing IaaS for cloud-computing operation. Based on the four concepts of "security, quality, service, and performance," Trade-Van aspires to become a leading cloud-computing value-added service company in the Asia-Pacific region.
Lian Kun-jin, president of Trade Van
Photo: Stella Lai, Digitimes, April 2011
Article translated by Philip Liu
