The relationship with Google and the markets he chose, starting as a solution provider primarily in the cloud, “enabled us to grow without having to deal with the baggage of being a traditional MSP trying to make the conversion to cloud.”

“For us there was no legacy,” Falcon said.

Cumulus now has 11 employees in Massachusetts and a sales office in New York. One third of their customers are based in New England, the rest across North America.

They’ve gone on to develop partnerships beyond Google, some of which help enhance the Google cloud ecosystem around the areas of data protection, backup recovery and endpoint user protection.

One aspect of the Cumulus model is not to challenge an existing IT environment, but rather to compliment it with a new range of services.

“We don’t displace your outside IT resources. That’s been a key to success because we’re less of a threat. The other IT provider doesn’t trench in and fight. We work with your IT provider to make the transition smooth and effective,” he said.

The most exciting development right now for cloud-based IT solution providers involves offering desktop-as-a-service, according to Falcon. Cumulus, partnering with virtual desktop vendor CloudConnect, has seen increased demand for the service ever since the expiration of Microsft Windows XP.

“We say you don’t need to spend $900 on a new PC and new operating license and latest version of Microsoft Office. We can put you in Google Apps and cloud store and we can give you access to that environment through a web-browser,” he said.

And the next big thing, Falcon predicts, is a move away from any on-premises server infrastructure. The last step to achieving that will involve cloud-based identity management.

“For most companies, the remaining pieces are specific lines of business apps that are not on cloud. Then print management and finally user authentication,” he said. “The last machine running on premises will be the active directory server to log in to the network … The future is a single sign-on login on a web site.”

A new crop of identity management vendors are entering the cloud space right now, all geared toward enterprise, Falcon said.

“You just click and open up a virtual Windows environment. We’re headed in that direction.”

And if Falcon’s learned anything since going into the cloud-based IT business, it’s that you have to recognize where the technology is going, and get there before your customers do.

If you don’t do that, you become just another legacy business struggling to adapt.