Australian SME Business News and Accounting Articles

At present, half of firms are already adapting cloud computing in their business processes after being convinced of the technology’s benefits. According to a new research by Spiceworks, a social business network company, a good 46% of the total 1,200 small and medium-sized businesses is already using this online accounting.

In CloudPro’s report, this figure reflects an increase from what only used to be 28% who were using the Australian accounting software earlier in 2011.

"Despite market fluctuations, 2011 proved to be a great year for disruptive technologies as SMBs increasingly adopted tablet computers, cloud services and virtualisation technology," says Jay Hallberg who is the co-founder and vice-president of marketing at the research study.

Cloud computing has been considered helpful and efficient by many small businesses. This is because IT functions such as database servers, file servers, document storage, and application development are given an alternative.

There are many advantages that can be achieved by any business that engages in cloud computing. The following is a rundown of these.

As the government red tape is increasing more than 30 per cent over the past five years, a total of $7 billion a year in taxes, fees, and other charges are slugging small businesses in Queensland.

Family businesses in Queensland are struggling through 90,000 pages of regulation that govern the sector.

Burgeoning paperwork and some extra cost of taxes are being blamed by a huge chunk of operators as the reasons behind slumped growth and progress. These paper works include mandatory permits and licenses, calculation methods, audits by payroll tax officials, and the fear of what might be brought about by the carbon tax next year.

It has been seen that more and more Financial Services providers will be using cloud computing in the years to come. This is according to the new research by Gartner, an independent analyst body, that says a rapid shift is occurring in the banking industry.

It is during the Gartner Symposium/ITxpo 2011 where the said research will be discussed. It will happen on November 7 to 10 in Barcelona.

According to Peter Redshaw, managing vice president at Gartner, cloud computing “should be innovative, dedicated to this industry, and transformative”.

An October 21, 2011 report by the industry researcher International Data Corporation (IDC) positively confirms what IT developers and IT development followers’ previous prediction of an immense increase in the use of cloud-computing systems.

The new forecast entitled, “Worldwide Enterprise Storage for Public and Private Cloud 2011-2015–Forecast: Enabling Public Cloud Service Providers and Private Clouds” reveals that overall spending by public cloud service providers on storage hardware, software, and professional services will increase at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 23.6 % from 2010-2015, while enterprise spending on storage for the private cloud will experience a CAGR of 28.9 %. By 2015, combined spending for public and private cloud storage will be $22.6 billion worldwide.

Cloud computing is amazingly making waves today with many small businesses availing it as their software for accounting. This Australian accounting software has allowed companies to enjoy higher efficiency at a lower cost. Cloud computing also allows companies to recover data, manage data and information, as well as ensure security.

BBC declared last year that the software for accounting has “gone mainstream” as many businesses have transferred their businesses to the cloud.

According to the recent ANZ small business sales trends report, small business sales lifted for the fifth consecutive month in September. The report shows small business turnover increased by 5.2% year on year.

Based on ANZ data on the value of credit, debit and Eftpos transactions through its merchant terminals and ANZ card transactions processed through other systems for businesses, at least two-years-old with annual turnover less than $5 million.

ANZ Head of Australian Economics and Property Research, Ivan Colhoun, said year-to-date growth is "fairly flat" at 1.7%. "And with headline inflation running at around 3.5% y/y in 2011, this implies real (inflation-adjusted) small business sales growth is still relatively weak in September," says Colhoun.