The Value Perspective to Deploying a Cloudlet Business Model for SMEs

The provision of Cloud services through the use of a Cloudlet technology, provides a number of advantages with regards to Quality of Experience (QoE) for its consumers. The QoE includes, but is not limited to free of cost, low-latency, and one-hop WiFi network consumption. Most of the advantages are achieved through the deployment of a comprehensive business model. A well-defined business model is one with well-defined value logic. Value creation is a fundamental element of a business model. It helps identify relevant customer segments, value proposition for customers and mechanism that will be used to provide the created value. However, poorly defined value logic into a business model can lead to business failure in addressing their customers' needs and issues. The literature reveals that researchers delved more into the evaluation of Cloud business models and its subsequent value creation, but none has attempted on either creation or deployment of a Cloudlet Business model. Therefore, this study introduces a Cloudlet Business Model (CBM) that can be used to support the easy deployment of a Cloudlet technology by SMEs such as coffee shops and shopping malls. In order for SMEs to meet their customers' needs and be able to sustain their businesses. This study undertakes the use of a Four Box model to bring out the value perspective of a CBM. This resulted in the identification of the value as small data, how it is generated, delivered and compensated for especially cost in ensuring the effectiveness of a CBM on the SMEs.