Byte Night is the IT industry’s annual sleep out in support of Action for Children. Each year hundreds of individuals and teams from across the IT and business community spend a night exposed to the elements in a bid to raise sponsorship and awareness of Action for Children’s work.

Attributed to Thomas J. Watson Sr. (1874-1956) while he was president of International Business Machines, this apocryphal quote could turn out to be true in a manner of speaking if one were to rephrase the statement thus: ‘I think there is a world market for maybe five computer clouds.’ But would five clouds be enough? And if so, what services would these clouds offer and how might an organisation benefit from using them rather than more traditional on-premises solutions?