Among other things, issues related to cloud pricing models were tackled at Interop.

"The reason cloud is compelling is the pricing levels," said Allan Leinwand, a Panorama Capital partner who moderated a vendor panel at the show. But the cloud industry has come up with several types of billing options, and they're not always easy to understand.

"You're talking about units that people don't normally think about," Leinwand said. "CPU hours: that's not something I go buy. I buy a blade server, and the hours are infinite, they're mine."

On the mobile front, a standing-room-only crowd took in a session on iPhones in the enterprise and raised a slew of questions about the security implications.

Despite enthusiasm over such topics, results from surveys conducted at the show were indicative of the tough times in the IT industry and most industries in general. Some 58% of 930 attendees by Interop said their IT budgets will be flat to down this year compared with 2008.