Cloud Computing -- The
Glide OS Story

Advance Praise

I have been watching Glide since its earliest days and talking with Donald Leka about each new version. This book does a great job of summarizing the Glide evolution and showing just how far it's come.
Ron Miller,
Freelance Technology Journalist, APEX Award Winner

This book provides a master class for entrepreneurs, early-stage investors, and venture capitalists by amply illustrating the types of problems, challenges, and opportunities that confront all new companies, but especially those operating at the bleeding and leading edge of technological change. The direct narrative and the lessons learned will apply broadly as a valuable case study not only for start-ups seeking to raise capital and manage growth but also for the people who work with and for them.
Harold L. Vogel, PhD
Author of Entertainment Industry Economics

Open systems and cross platform functionality would seem to be ‘no brainer’ visions that should be easily accepted by the computer industry, right? Not so when these ideas seem to threaten the business ecosystems and profit models of the major players in the industry they seek to improve.    Cloud Computing - The Glide OS Story is an interesting and insightful  account –and also quite humorous at times -- by the entrepreneurs who have lived it over the last eight years -- of the challenges faced in introducing a new better way to an industry built around propriety systems and a fantasy of walled gardens, even though users (remember them?)  regularly have to contend in their lives with a cross platform “real world” combining Microsoft Windows, Google Android, and Apple iOS/OS X devices, and multiple cloud services.

Students of winning in business and technology will learn much about “applied stakeholder analysis” in action, including the creative building of linkages to the major players, and the refining and re-positioning of products that has been necessary so that truly “everybody leaves the party happy” and even established players in the industry could find benefits in cross platform functionality  -- as well as the users (remember them?).  All this during an era of global financial crisis and continuous changes as  Apple , Google, and Microsoft have battled for supremacy.
Dr. Barry Unger,
Innovation and Technology Management Professor at Boston University

Donald Leka

Mr. Donald Leka is the Founder, Chairman, and CEO of TransMedia Corporation, creator of the industry leading and award winning cloud-computing platform, the Glide OS.

Mr. Leka has been a featured speaker and presenter at Harvard Business School, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), TechCrunch50, the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the All Things Digital Conference (AllThingsD), New York University (NYU), Boston University (BU), The American University (AU) and Georgetown University.

• Masters in Business Administration (MBA)
• The American University, Washington, DC
• Bachelor of Arts Degree (BA), International Relations
• The American University, Washington D.C.
• Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award Finalist

Claire Leka

Claire Leka is a television journalist, anchor and correspondent specializing in business and finance news. For a long part of her career, she worked for CNN as a correspondent and anchor reporting from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Claire has also worked as an anchor and correspondent for MSNBC, NBC News, CBS News, WCBS, and WABC.

• MA, Journalism and Public Affairs, The American University, School of Communication, Washington, DC
• BA, Public Communication, The American University, School of Communication, Washington, DC