At the Consumer Electronics Show next week, we expect to see a host of companies, large and small, offering backend cloud integration services. These range from the startup Active Video, with its signature HTML5-powered Cloud TV app, to the publicly-traded prime mover Akamai, offering its Terra enterprise solution. In recent months, we have reported significant cloud-related news from major players such as Amazon, Google, Oracle and Verizon. We anticipate this wave to continue in Las Vegas.

From 3D printing to video and photo duplication services, many exhibitors will tout a cloud component. Consumers are growing more comfortable accessing entertainment via iCloud, UltraViolet and HBO Go — while Google Docs and Microsoft Office 360 are becoming workflow fixtures. Meanwhile, smart home remote access and connected vehicles are further entrenching the cloud.

Retail outlet windows now contain sensors that interact with smartphones, triggering geo-targeted promotions that hit while you’re within point of purchase range of a store and collecting information about your traffic patterns. Soon this tech will extend to your car.

A new report from Gartner says the Internet of Things “will grow to 26 billion units installed in 2020 representing an almost 30-fold increase from 0.9 billion in 2009… IoT product and service suppliers will generate incremental revenue exceeding $300 billion, mostly in services, in 2020. It will result in $1.9 trillion in global economic value-add through sales into diverse end markets.”

In November, we reported that Amazon is launching two new Web services to get apps, games and desktops running on the cloud. AppStream enables developers to run an app in Amazon’s cloud that can then be distributed to users on a variety of platforms — while WorkSpaces will allow virtual desktops to be managed through Amazon’s cloud for less than half the cost of a company maintaining its own virtualization servers.

There is also buzz surrounding Verizon’s next generation cloud platform, announced in October and a big attraction in the company’s Venetian suites. As reported earlier on ETCentric, Verizon Cloud includes two primary components: Verizon Cloud Compute (its “Infrastructure as a Service” platform) and Verizon Cloud Storage (an object-based service), which will target enterprises, mid-size companies and development shops.

The “personal cloud” is something we’ll be hearing a lot about at the Venetian, where firms including IMD Squared and MeeBoss offer consumers 24/7 connectivity to their data via their own encrypted cloud.

Octoshape is touting broadband technology for delivering premium content cost-effectively anywhere on the globe. Online gaming is also turning to the cloud. Sony Entertainment’s Gaikai unit, which has made about 200 games available for interconnected online play, is working on its second generation platform (with hints that it may be for more than just games).

Scalability, security and privacy are among the bigger issues with which cloud purveyors are grappling, and are sure to be addressed at the CES Connecting to the Cloud conference track on Wednesday, January 8, hosted by the Distributed Computing Industry Association.

On a macro-level, media firms continue to explore ways the cloud can facilitate better distribution and marketing to consumers, while on the trade side, investigating how optimized metadata tagging and industry standards can improve workflow and long-term archiving.

Be sure to check back with us next week as we report live from the CES show floor on the latest in cloud developments.

Related Stories:
Google Gets Serious About Public Cloud: Previews New API, ETCentric, 1/2/14
Marketing Cloud: Oracle to Acquire Responsys for $1.5 Billion, ETCentric, 12/23/13
Google to Announce Plan for Cloud Computing and Data Storage, ETCentric, 12/4/13
Netflix Plans Streaming Traffic Across Amazon Cloud Regions, ETCentric, 12/4/13
New DreamWorks Animation Software Taps into Private Cloud, ETCentric, 10/23/13