utility computing - technical definition

Pay-per-usage processing provided by a service organization that uses its own computers and facilities. Also called "on demand computing," customers access the computers via a private network or over the Internet and are charged for the amount of computing time they use, such as CPU seconds, minutes or hours.

If the service organization also includes the software, the organization is called an "application service provider" (ASP), and the products fall under the umbrella of "software-as-a-service" (SaaS). See ASP and SaaS. See also grid computing and cloud computing.