A risk comparison framework for evaluating the impact of telecom cloudification in organizational risk profile

Cloud computing has provided new dimensions and opportunities to telecom providers to enhance their ability in creating new revenue streams, reduce operational costs and increase customer satisfaction. In recent years, the progression of evolving cloud computing systems is huge. Conversely, it also encountered a lot of new challenges to the institutions utilizing cloud systems. It is critical to evaluate the change in organizational risk profile before deciding the level of cloud adoption. The conventional risk assessment framework of telecom providers may be unsuitable for cloud computing owing to the difficulties in the configuration. This paper aims to propose a system to quantify the influences of cloud adoption in telecom risk profile. This study also provides a comparison of overall risk profile change between clouds enabled infrastructure, traditional on-premises information technology solutions, and a combination of both in the telecom sector. The result encourages the selective adoption of the hybrid cloud model which demonstrated a relatively low organizational risk score. This work contributes to cloud computing business research by providing a holistic risk comparison model which reflects the distinctiveness of telecom service provider’s assets and capabilities.