It’s sometimes hard to think back to the days before ‘cloud computing’ was coined as a term in the IT industry. At Freeform Dynamics, we first started using the word ‘cloud’ in our coverage of the IT industry in 2008.

Many of the fundamental concepts underpinning cloud as we know it today, however, were being discussed in relation to ‘utility computing’, ‘grid computing’ and ‘advanced virtualisation’ way before that date.

And if you are old enough to have enjoyed the dot-com rollercoaster ride back in the late 90’s and early 00’s, you will undoubtedly remember the emergence of Application Service Providers (ASPs), those early pioneers of Software as a Service (SaaS).