develops fact-based strategic insights for senior executives around critical public and private sector issues. This executive report is based on an in-depth study by the Institute’s research team. It is part of an ongoing commitment by IBM Global Business Services to provide analysis and viewpoints that help companies realize business value. You may contact the authors or send an e-mail to iibv@us.ibm.com for more information. Additional studies from the IBM Institute for Business Value can be found at ibm.com/iibv

develops fact-based strategic insights for senior executives around critical public and private sector issues. This executive report is based on an in-depth study by the Institute’s research team. It is part of an ongoing commitment by IBM Global Business Services to provide analysis and viewpoints that help companies realize business value. You may contact the authors or send an e-mail to iibv@us.ibm.com for more information. Additional studies from the IBM Institute for Business Value can be found at ibm.com/iibv

With the significant advances in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) over the last half century, there is an increasingly perceived vision that computing will one day be the 5th utility (after water, electricity, gas, and telephony). This computing utility, like all other four existing utilities, will provide the basic level of computing service that is considered essential to meet the everyday needs of the general community. To deliver this vision, a number of computing paradigms have been proposed, of which the latest one is known as Cloud computing. Hence, in this paper, we define Cloud computing and provide the architecture for creating Clouds with market-oriented resource allocation by leveraging technologies such as Virtual Machines (VMs). We also provide insights on market-based resource management strategies that encompass both customer-driven service management and computational risk management to sustain Service Level Agreement (SLA)-oriented resource allocation. In addition, we reveal our early thoughts on interconnecting Clouds for dynamically creating global Cloud exchanges and markets. Then, we present some representative Cloud platforms, especially those developed in industries along with our current work towards realizing market-oriented resource allocation of Clouds as realized in Aneka enterprise Cloud technology. Furthermore, we highlight the difference between High Performance Computing (HPC) workload and Internet-based services workload. We also describe a meta-negotiation infrastructure to establish global Cloud

customer service and loyalty: A perspective in the airline industry

Service-Oriented Computing (SOC) is a new computing paradigm that utilizes services as the basic constructs to support the development of rapid, low-cost and easy composition of distributed applications even in heterogeneous environments. The visionary promise of Service-Oriented Computing is a world of cooperating services where application components are assembled with little effort into a network of services that can be loosely coupled to create flexible dynamic business processes and agile applications that may span organisations and computing platforms. SOC is being shaped by, and increasingly will help shape, modern society as a whole, especially in the areas of dynamic and on-demand business, health and government services. The subject of Service Oriented Computing is vast and enormously complex, spanning many concepts and technologies that find their origins in diverse disciplines that are woven together in an intricate manner. In addition, there is a need to merge technology with an understanding of business processes and organizational structures, a combination of recognizing an enterprise's pain points and the potential solutions that can be applied to correct them. The material in research spans an immense and diverse spectrum of literature, in origin and in character. As a result research activities at both worldwide as well as at European level are very fragmented. This necessitates that a broader vision

The case for a smarter approach to CRM 14 Help getting started 19The changing customer

The main objective of this dissertation is to analyze the strategic impact of Gamification in brands ’ and retailers ’ CRM strategy, with a deep focus on loyalty and reward programs. Having this in mind, the main research questions of this dissertation aim to understand if there are certain

solutions in the processes of customer knowledge management, and there are presented examples of the use of different types of social media in the management of different types of customer knowledge. Key words: social CRM, CRM 2.0, SCRM, social technology, customer knowledge management

case study from Pakistan, where ICT industry and specifically CRM is in the initial stages of adoption. This research effort has not only revealed the social aspects of CRM implementation but also unfolded some cultural aspects associated with the CRM in Pakistan. In order to guide the research, theory

transformed to a hyper-connected habitué of social media. Permanently tethered to their electronic devices they traverse the social media landscape seeking engagement and en-lightenment all the while being exposed to a multitude of product and brand messages. As such, the new consumer is informed, self