"What's fueling the interest in RIA?" asked Regev Yativ, President & CEO of Magic Software Enterprises in the Americas, at the beginning of his session at AJAX World RIA Conference & Expo in NYC last month.

The answer is the growth of broadband, Yativ said, which has made the Internet more popular now in the USA than even TV. It is what fueled the explosion known as Web 2.0, and ended "surfing the web" to be replaced by Googling and Twittering and Facebooking.

This Web 2.0 frenzy has brought with us an explosive growth in Web 2.0 functionality, Yativ noted. And this in turn has created new expectations for business apps. Web applications now have to have richer interfaces and unlimited access. Mobility has become key. Users want complete business functionality, and practical solutions for business pain.

"A real business platform in the Web 2.0 age must provide solutions for all these requirements - simultaneously," he added.

Data visualization, an individualized work environment, business agility, a rich and engaging user experience - all these aspects help build loyalty and customer retention, which in turn means that RIA is driving profits up.

Everyone talks about ROI, but Yativ believes that "ROEI" is just as important: "Return on Existing Investment" - in the current tight economy companies want help with cashing in on their past investment.

RIAs can reduce expenses - replacing less efficient options, for example, like old legacy thin clients systems, VPNs, "home grown" apps and so on.

RIAs address IT priorities by allowing access to enterprise application data and functionality via alternative interfaces. RIAs can extend Enterprise Applications to business users, even those business users that traditionally don't like dealing with software.

Forrester Research says that "Portals Need RIA" - off-premise RIA is what Cloud Computing is all about.

The requirement of an Enterprise Cloud are many: security and compliance, a rich user interface, management and control, support, standards, performance. At the end of the day, Yativ argued, what is in the Cloud is RIA.

One of the biggest barriers to moving to the cloud is the loss of control it implicitly involves.

RIA is ready for the Cloud, he contended. The four keys to readiness are Provisioning, Browser-Free Deployment, plus it has to be metadata driven and it has to be a unitary platform.

Which RIA platform is ready for the Cloud? Not surprisingly, since it is the flagship offering of his company, Yativ's answer was: uniPaaS,

Magic's uniPaaS doesn't narrow your choices - no matter what database you're running, and no matter what operating system. Overall his own answer to his opening question is: "Yes!" RIA is ready for the Cloud, if you choose the right path to it and the right platform.

• SYS-CON's Cloud Expo Adds Two New Tracks