50 IT Pro March/April 2017 P u b l i s h e d b y t h e I E E E C o m p u t e r S o c i e t y 1520-9202/17/$33.00 © 2017 IEEE

Cloud Computing

Jorge Pereira, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil

Evaldo O. da Silva, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro

Thais Batista, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil

Flávia C. Delicato and Paulo F. Pires, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro

Samee U. Khan, North Dakota State University

Cloud computing technologies have gained broad adoption in recent years in both industry and government. For both sectors, this technology is seen as

a way to reduce costs, speed up processes, and provision new services.

According to many observers and industry ex-perts, the Latin American market has recently entered a new era of cloud computing. Hun-dreds of thousands of companies have migrated, or are in the process of migrating, to the cloud, with the aim of improving the way they work,

becoming more efficient, and making their pro-cesses more productive. Although most of the world revenue derived from public cloud services will be generated in Western Europe and North America, other areas, including Latin America, continental China, and the Asia-Pacific region, will demonstrate the highest growth rates.1 Latin America’s share in public cloud services is cur-rently about 5 percent of the world total, but its projected annual growth rate—approximately 26 percent—suggests that such services will be adopted at a faster rate there than in Europe or

Several industries in Brazil use cloud computing technologies, and the government is considering it for IT services. This article provides an overview of cloud adoption in Brazil on the part of various government and industry sectors.

Cloud Adoption in Brazil

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the Asia-Pacific region. In Latin America, Brazil has the greatest revenues from cloud services.1

Since 2008, Brazilian organizations have been widely adopting cloud computing.2 Currently, 41 percent of companies in Brazil use cloud tech-nologies.3 Reduced operational costs appear to be a primary driver of cloud computing adop-tion by industry in Brazil. Other factors include the need to innovate IT services; improvements in productivity, customer services, and customer access; the use of policies based on IT services to improve business support; and faster applica-tion deployment.2 A fragile economy is also an important factor leading to the need for reduced operational costs.

Considering Brazil’s growing relevance as a player in the world cloud scenario, we carried forward this work to report the current status of cloud adoption in Brazil. In particular, we focus on the initiatives undertaken by sectors such as governmental organizations, private companies, and universities. We also discuss the impact and challenges of cloud adoption in Brazil by iden-tifying trends and the most widely used models and technologies.

Cloud ServicesThe three most common types of cloud services are software as a service (SaaS), platform as a service (PaaS), and infrastructure as a service (IaaS). SaaS describes any cloud service that provides applica-tions designed for end users and delivered over the web. PaaS offers a platform on which soft-ware can be developed, deployed, executed, and managed. IaaS provides resources such as stor-age and network connections.2

Cloud services can be offered as public, pri-vate, or hybrid clouds. Public clouds encompass services that are available as pay-per-use to the general public. Private clouds, on the other hand, involve organizations deploying cloud services using internal datacenters that are unavailable to the general public.4 A hybrid cloud is an imple-mentation model in which some resources are provided as a service using an internal private cloud, and other features are provided by service providers through a public cloud.

The benefits of managing IT resources and business innovations with cloud computing can be observed in both the private sector and gov-ernmental organizations. Public cloud initiatives

can contribute to service delivery in several areas, such as healthcare, education, and urban mobil-ity. At universities, for example, cloud computing can be adopted to provide educational facilities for online learning, teaching, and research col-laboration. In private companies, cloud comput-ing can add value to the business and leverage new market opportunities based on scalability and the hiring of services according to the orga-nization’s needs.

Adoption in IndustryIn this section, we detail the main trends relat-ed to cloud use in Brazilian industries. We also highlight the main cloud technologies used, as well as growth projections for the use of these technologies.

Cloud Adoption TendenciesSeveral reports described tendencies in the adop-tion of different cloud models (SaaS, PaaS, and

IaaS) in Brazil.2,3,5 A 2013 Frost & Sullivan study, for example, presented investment trends for each cloud computing model through the year 2017.3 According to the study, as of 2016, Brazil will have invested roughly US$1 billion in SaaS, $600 million in PaaS, and $550 million in IaaS. These amounts are expected to grow in 2017, reaching an investment of $1.25 billion in SaaS, $750 million in PaaS, and $650 million in IaaS.

A study from Capgemini reported on the percentage of cloud use in 2014 and organi-zations’ intention to use the different cloud computing models through 2016.2 According to this study, SaaS was adopted by 73 percent of the respondents in 2014, and would con-tinue to be implemented through 2016, with intention to use manifested by 92 percent of the respondents. In 2014, only 39 percent of respondents adopted the PaaS model, but this

The benefits of managing IT resources and business innovations with cloud computing can be observed in both the private sector and governmental organizations.

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Cloud Computing

Messaging and collaboration

Mobile device management

Customer content management

Supply chain management

Business intelligence

Customer relationship management

Enterprise resource planning

Compute as a service

Virtual desktop infrastructure

Virtual machines

Archiving as a service

Storage as a service

Backup as a service

Runtimes

Databases

Web servers

PaaS

IaaS

SaaS

15

25 35

1924

26 33

3926

31

31 33

1436

40 23

2043

25 25

39 28

61 22

38 30

61 28

59

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

30

20

26

Usage in 2014 (%) Additional use through 2016 (%)

Figure 1. Cloud usage in 2014 and projected growth through 2016. Growth is projected for the three main types of cloud models—software as a service (SaaS), platform as a service (PaaS), and infrastructure as a service (IaaS)—in various application areas.

panorama was set to grow to 73 percent by 2016. The IaaS model was used a little more than the PaaS model. In 2014, the IaaS model was used by 55 percent of respondents. Howev-er, IaaS model adoption was expected to reach 88 percent in 2016. The study also shows the percentage of the main applications and cloud services used by Brazilian companies in 2014 and the expected growth in use by 2016. These data are shown in Figure 1 and discussed in more detail in subsequent sections.

Tendencies in Using SaaSCapgemini’s report shows the expected growth of SaaS for different types of applications,2 as de-picted in Figure 1.

There is a declining tendency in customer re-lationship management (CRM) and enterprise content management (ECM) application use by 11 percent and 5 percent, respectively. On the other hand, the report shows growth in the use of business intelligence (BI), mobile device manage-ment, and messaging and collaboration applica-tions by 13, 10, and 11 percent, respectively. The financial services segment is the sector that most influences cloud services when it comes to “BI as a service.”2 In addition, applications such as en-

terprise resource planning (ERP) and supply chain management (SCM) are likely to evolve in the coming years.

These percentages can influence other cloud models. BI applications can generate an impact in storage as a service, a model related to IaaS. This impact means an increase in demand for infrastructure, given that BI ap-plications that need more space to store historical data also are likely to acquire database services in the cloud.

Another area of growth is related to transactional applications, such as ERP and SCM. Also, we can assume that webservers will be a growing tendency, given that they become a necessary solution in running trans-actional applications. Finally, the growth of messaging and collabora-tion applications shows the need for more archiving as a service.

Tendencies in Using PaaSIn Brazil, PaaS has been regarded as the less-at-tractive component of the cloud model, with adop-tion around 39 percent. According to Capgemini, database and webserver use will grow 23 percent and 24 percent, respectively.2 Runtime comput-ing solutions also show a growth of 24 percent (see Figure 1).

In 2014, Gartner published a report describing technologies used in the PaaS model,6 mainly ap-plication platform as a service. This new paradigm in cloud computing proposes a software development cycle using the PaaS model. The idea is to improve the distribution of applications and attract new partners and independent software sellers.7

Tendencies in Using IaaSThe IaaS model has higher adoption compared to the PaaS model, around 55 percent, which will likely increase in an accelerated way over the coming years. It was estimated that for 2016, the IaaS model would increase up to 33 percent, reaching 88 percent usage in industry. The num-bers illustrated in Figure 1 show that some ser-vices will grow over the coming years, including backup as a service (BUaaS), virtual machines (VM), and compute as a service (CaaS).

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BUaaS is the most-mentioned model, with expect-ed growth around 22 percent. CaaS has a growth expectation of around 14 percent, and it appears to be a synonym for IaaS. CaaS provides process-ing power and is seen as a resource to reduce capital expenditure spent on physical infrastructure.2 VM services show similar percentages of future growth, around 20 percent.

Governmental InitiativesBrazilian governmental departments have cre-ated several pilot projects aimed at using cloud computing. The government has also made some advances in legislation to regulate the cloud’s use in government agencies.

Express CloudReleased in 2011 by the Federal Data Processing Service (SERPRO) and Dataprev, Express Cloud is a free solution that aims to integrate all tasks related to communication in public administra-tion. It aims to provide a complete communica-tion suite, aggregating email, calendar, instant messaging, voice-over-IP services, workflow, gov-ernment directories, and message and calendar synchronization on mobile devices. In addition, it provides encryption and environments for traf-ficking and storing government data.

With Express Cloud, service costs are much lower than the current price charged by propri-etary solutions. Thus, it enables the use of a free, robust, and integrated communication solution in public institutions, and contributes to reduc-ing costs.

Complementary Rule 14/IN01/DSIC/GSIPRIn 2012, the government established the 14/IN01/DSIC/GSIPR complementary rule (dsic.planalto.gov.br/documentos/nc_14_nuvem.pdf) to guide the use of cloud computing technologies in insti-tutions and entities of the Federal Public Admin-istration (APF).

In addition, the document says that when hir-ing a cloud computing service for APF, an in-stitution should make sure that “Brazilian law prevails over any other, to take all legal guar-antees as taker of the service and owner of in-formation hosted on the cloud.” This concern is important because, in the cloud computing model, there are no boundaries for provisioning services.

Another concern is related to safety require-ments and quality of service, which are addressed in guideline 5.2.3: “The provision of a service contract, if applicable, must contain clauses en-suring the availability, integrity, confidentiality, and authenticity of the information hosted in the cloud, especially that under the custody and management of the service provider.”

The publication of this rule defines several di-rections for hiring cloud services to ensure the security, integrity, availability, and sovereignty of data.

Government Cloud PlatformIn 2013, SERPRO launched its first cloud plat-form service, which was designed to prioritize the government’s use of free software, such as the OpenStack cloud computing platform.

Through the platform, customers can hire a hardware and software infrastructure available at a SERPRO datacenter. One of the main advan-

tages of using this service is the speed of resource delivery.

The first customer for this service was the Ministry of Telecommunications, which uses SERPRO’s cloud to host services for several cit-ies, including portals and applications developed to improve local administration in the areas of school management, financial and tax manage-ment, public health, appointments, and informa-tion dissemination to citizens.

Shared DatacenterIn 2014, Brazil launched two shared datacenters (SDC) for cloud computing. This project helps to improve IT infrastructure in universities. It is the result of partnerships among the Ministries of Science, Technology, and Innovation; Education; the Insti-tute for Amazonian Research; the National Edu-cation and Research Network; and Huawei global

Express Cloud enables the use of a free, robust, and integrated communication solution in public institutions, and contributes to reducing costs.

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Cloud Computing

information and communications technology solutions.

SDCs are datacenters with high storage capac-ity, sharing, and data transmission. There are more than a thousand servers available to the scientific community, and each structure has a storage capacity of 0.5 petabytes.

By using SDC, research institutions will have access to a large volume of information shared in scientific databases, and they will have more agil-ity and flexibility in using computing resources and for data processing. The expectation is that SDCs will be used in different areas of science, culture preservation, and health applications.

Adoption in Brazilian UniversitiesBrazilian universities have already realized the benefits that cloud computing can provide to the academic environment and society. Cloud com-

puting has been successfully applied in academia for the provision of essential services and as a way to streamline processes and facilitate collabora-tion between researchers and students. This sec-tion presents the main initiatives of Brazilian universities to train students on this subject and employ the cloud computing paradigm as part of universities’ computational systems.

CloudUSPTo optimize the IT infrastructure at the Univer-sity of São Paulo (USP) and make better use of it, USP began implementing an infrastructure in 2011 for a cloud computing platform called Cloud-USP. The platform provides various services to the academic community at USP that can be ac-cessed by PCs, mobile devices, and thin-client terminals distributed across the university. The main benefits the platform provides are resource savings, better visibility for the university, sus-

tainability, e-waste reduction, energy savings, digital safety, and patrimonial security.

The services CloudUSP provides are divided into three areas:

•Corporate. This includes email services, pay-ments, management of human resources, management of courses and grades, and the is-suance of diplomas and certificates, agreements, and contracts.

•Education. Services focus on managing gradu-ate, postgraduate, and extension courses as well as part of the university’s research activi-ties. They also include the adoption of elec-tronic media in classroom teaching practices, and the availability of educational content in the form of digital media.

• Scientific. These services are related to scientific research activities, with emphasis on mass data storage services (instrumentation data, collec-tions, and so on) and intensive computational processing.

CloudUSP is currently the largest cloud for a university in Latin America, and the first in Brazil. Its estimated project costs were US$200 million.

Cloud Computing Laboratory UFCGRecently, Huawei and the Federal University of Campina Grande (UFCG) in northeastern Brazil established a partnership for research and development dedicated to educating and training students in cloud computing and tech-nological innovation. The project goal was to enable the institution’s students to work with machines and software in a cloud environment. The project included installing a research laboratory at the UFCG campus. The labora-tory, designed with the latest technology, will be used to train students in cloud computing and perform research focused on technological innovation.

Initially, a group of students from UFCG will be subjected to a 13-month training course in vari-ous disciplines. The cloud computing training will contribute to the creation of a model of digi-tal cities with public services available on a digital platform. At the end of the course, students will receive a certificate of qualification and will be able to apply for a job in this specific market.

Brazilian universities have already realized the benefits that cloud computing can provide to the academic environment and society.

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Cloud Adoption ChallengesBy providing ICT “as a service,” cloud computing offers several benefits for all users. In government entities, these benefits could be even greater, con-sidering the processes used in such institutions for maintaining IT resources, which are often inefficient, bureaucratic, slow, and inflexible, and where the cost/benefit is not always properly jus-tified.8 However, there are still many challenges to be considered by government and industry to maximize the benefits of using this technology.

Legal ChallengesBrazil still lacks laws that make clear the rights and responsibilities of cloud computing provid-ers and their contractors and ensure security for citizens, businesses, and government when using the cloud.

In 2013, a congressman proposed a law that aims to regulate the relationship between users and cloud computing providers. According to him, an appropriate regulatory environment is crucial to promote the expansion of cloud com-puting in the country and make Brazil competi-tive to receive foreign investment in this area.

The law ensures that a cloud computing sup-plier may not use, research, or transfer to a third party data for which it is the depository. It pro-vides that, in the case of hosting outsourcing, the company becomes co-responsible for any mis-use, loss, or data leakage.

In addition, this law determines that there should be no exclusive conditions or privileges for any technology, mechanism, or platform through recruitment, hardware, software, or application used in the cloud. The project also provides sup-port for nondiscrimination in the process of trans-mission, packaging, or routing information by reason of content, origin, destination, service, ap-plication, or otherwise, except in cases provided by law or regulations.

The proposal is filed with the House of Repre-sentatives. The regulation of cloud services is very important to providers and service users to ensure the widespread adoption of cloud computing.

Data SecurityThe greatest challenge to the adoption of cloud computing in Brazil is security. Despite the con-sensus that security is a critical area, many Bra-zilian companies still lack adequate practices and

solutions to ensure the security of their informa-tion in the cloud. Because of this gap, 55.1 per-cent of Brazilian companies have some type of restriction on the use of cloud tools, according to a 2015 survey conducted by Invest Tech (bit.ly/2kqwaHH), in which 450 professionals par-ticipated from audit areas (55.3 percent), IT (16 percent), control risks (17 percent), information security (3.7 percent), and others. The survey also collected information about how Brazilian com-panies manage the security of their IT data. As a result, it was observed that 55.3 percent of the interviewed companies have no tools or projects related to governance, risk management, and com-pliance. Of these companies, 38.4 percent plan to use related solutions in the future; 20.5 percent of respondents were unaware of any type of solution.

The government, on the other hand, has se-curity restrictions specific to cloud platform use. These restrictions are clearly defined in the com-plementary rule 14/IN01/DSIC/GSIPR (section

III B). This rule defines, among other things, that before contracting a cloud service, government agencies should make sure that the contract con-tains clauses that ensure the availability, integri-ty, and confidentiality of data, and that Brazilian law prevails over any other.

Despite the challenges related to cloud adoption in Brazil, the trend is for the use of this technology to grow in the coming

years due to the many benefits it can provide. According to a 2012 report on governance in Brazil, the government sees cloud computing as a way to reduce costs, accelerate processes, support large projects, and provide new services (bit.ly/2j3hpKM).

Although there are still open challenges, partic-ularly with regard to legislation and safety, several

Many Brazilian companies still lack adequate practices and solutions to ensure the security of their information in the cloud.

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Cloud Computing

industries and universities already use this tech-nology, and it is expected that use will grow. The government faces a more bureaucratic environ-ment for employing cloud computing; it has never-theless shown considerable interest in its adoption, and has taken several concrete actions to promote cloud use in various public administration agen-cies. The trend for the next few years is for indus-try and the Brazilian government to become major consumers of cloud services and platforms.

References 1. W. Peres Núñez, Cloud Computing in Latin America:

Current Situation and Policy Proposals, Economic Com-mission for Latin America and the Caribbean, Apr. 2014; bit.ly/2jIa27Y.

2. Business Cloud in Brazil: Research Report 2014—At the Tipping Point of Accelerated Adoption, Capgemini Con-sulting, 2014; www.br.capgemini.com/business cloudbrazil2014.

3. F. Belfort, “Analyst Briefing: What Trends Will Be Hot in Brazil 2013?” Frost & Sullivan, analyst briefing, 2013; pt.slideshare.net/FrostandSullivan/frost-sullivan-what -technology-trends-will-be-hot-in-brazil-in-2013.

4. H.D. Elias and S. Mirchandani, “Capitalizing on Cloud: Preparing People and Processes for Its Organizational Challenge,” EMC Perspective, 2012, pp. 1–10.

5. G.K. Campos, “Analysis of the Brazilian Cloud Com-puting Market,” Frost & Sullivan, executive summary, 2014; pt.slideshare.net/FrostandSullivan/frost -sullivan-analysis-of-the-brazilian-cloud-computing -market.

6. Application Platform as a Service: Enabling the Next Gen-eration of Application Development, Gartner, 2014; www.galeos.cz/uploads/Soubory/Rollbase/Gartner_aPaaS_Progress_Visionary_2015.pdf.

7. The Global State of Information Security Survey, PwC, 2014; pwc.to/2izbDQx.

8. M. de Alencar Veloso, Cloud Computing: Need and Benefits Expected with the Adoption of a Policy of Regulating and Encour-aging Its Use, 2013; www.escoladegoverno.pr.gov.br/arqui-vos/File/2013/V_CONSAD/VI_CONSAD/105.pdf.

Jorge Pereira is a master’s student in systems and com-puting at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN), Brazil. His research interests include cloud computing, the Internet of Things, software engineering, and distributed systems. Pereira has a bachelor’s degree in software engineering from UFRN. Contact him at jorge-pereirasb@gmail.com.

Evaldo O. da Silva is an IT professional and consultant with experience in the railway sector, telecom, and teaching under-graduate programs in computing. His research interests are in information systems for crew management, logistics, and cloud computing. Contact him at evaldo.oliveira@gmail.com.

Thais Batista is an associate professor in the computer science department at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (UFRN), Brazil. Her research interests include the Internet of Things, cloud computing, smart cities, soft-ware architecture, middleware, and model-based develop-ment. Batista is the head of the Software Engineering and Distributed Systems Group at UFRN. She received a PhD in computer science from the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro. Contact her at thaisbatista@gmail.com.

Flávia C. Delicato is an associate professor in the computer science department at the Federal University of Rio de Janei-ro. Her research interests include wireless sensor and actuator networks, middleware, adaptive systems, and the Internet of Things. Delicato is a CNPq Fellow Level 1. She received a PhD in electrical engineering from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. Contact her at fdelicato@gmail.com.

Paulo F. Pires is an associate professor in the computer science department at the Federal University of Rio de Ja-neiro, and integrates the Center for Distributed and High Performance Computing at the University of Sydney. His research interests include distributed systems, the Internet of Things, model-driven development, and software archi-tecture. Pires received a PhD in systems engineering from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. Contact him at paulo.f.pires@gmail.com.

Samee U. Khan is an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at the North Dakota State University. His research interests include optimization, robustness, and the security of systems. Khan’s work has appeared in more than 300 publications and he is on the editorial boards of IEEE Access, IEEE Cloud Computing, IEEE Com-munications Surveys & Tutorials, and IT Profession-al, among others. He is an ACM Distinguished Speaker, an IEEE Distinguished Lecturer, a fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology, and a fellow of the British Computer Society. Contact him at samee.khan@gmail.com.

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