  The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of the cloud technology on
current research information systems (CRIS). Based on an overview of published
literature and on empirical evidence from surveys, the paper presents main
characteristics, delivery models, service levels and general benefits of cloud
computing. The second part assesses how the cloud computing challenges the
research information management, from three angles: networking, specific
benefits, and the ingestion of data in the cloud. The third part describes
three aspects of the implementation of current research systems in the clouds,
i.e. service models, requirements and potential risks and barriers. The paper
concludes with some perspectives for future work. The paper is written for CRIS
administrators and users, in order to improve research information management
and to contribute to future development and implementation of these systems,
but also for scholars and students who want to have detailed knowledge on this
topic.
