I attended the very successful Cloud Computing event sponsored by MIT on Wednesday, which Sim Simeonov and others organized. At this point the event itself may be yesterday’s news, but a few of things came out of it that seemed noteworthy to me. Some are “micro” things about the cloud itself, how it drives innovations, pricing etc., but perhaps the most compelling is that the cloud it here and people are building great profitable companies around it today compared to energy and cleantech, which get all the mindshare, but who knows when economic conditions will reach a point where these technologies will actually be profitable.

First, Amazon Web Services is growing like topsy. I don’t know if Adam Selipsky is making his slides available but the growth in use of AWS services is massive. You don’t get this kind of growth without addressing a major need. The growth supports exactly what everyone I talk to thinks: The cloud will (1) drive down the cost of computing, (2) create all kinds of innovation around the cloud itself, and (3) drive down the cost of all sorts of non-cloud software related innovation.

Second, the variety of new companies being started to make the cloud more accessible is astonishing. Just look at the two presenters, Allurent and Stax Networks, for examples of the variety of new companies working the cloud. My guess is that there is a huge open frontier that is just beginning to be explored.

Third, pricing models for companies wanting to use cloud services are incredibly favorable. This fact just adds fuel to the cloud fire.

The cloud is a space that has a lot of mind share in certain sections of the tech community, but it does not have the broad visibility of, say, alternative energy or cleantech. Nonetheless, this is a space where there will be great opportunities for creating new profitable companies. In some respects it is a better bet for the next few years than renewable energy or cleantech because those technologies are not likely to be profitable until the price of oil goes back up a lot, and that could be years away. Cloud technologies will be profitable now.