Clouds are transforming IT; that's not news. But regardless of your cloud computing agenda, clouds are already affecting your IT plans, because they give IT executives a cudgel with which to bludgeon traditional software and infrastructure providers.

Every IT decision of any real consequence starts with a shortlist of three competing offerings. One of them is usually the incumbent provider -- Cisco, IBM, EMC, Microsoft, and so on. Along with this incumbent are a couple of alternate providers. Sometimes these providers are simply "column fodder" designed to rein in the incumbent; but many IT companies have built healthy businesses by being the alternate.

It's time for a fourth column: a cloud-based offering. That means every Request for Proposals that a company issues must have a cloud-based option, regardless of whether the company actually plans to adopt clouds. Here's why.

Read the article from Information Week / TechWeb here.