Government and Google banned from Intel gig

Beverley Head
Tuesday, 09 November 2010 20:06

IT Industry - Development

Government Departments may be among the planet's biggest investors in IT, but they have been deliberately excluded from an Intel inspired initiative aimed at shaping the future of cloud computing. Amazon and Google are also not invited to Intel's Cloud 2015 party just yet.

After five months of behind the scenes efforts chip giant Intel last week unveiled Cloud 15, which is intended to provide the standards and frameworks to promote the creation of interoperable federated clouds.

 

Jason Fedder, general manager data centre products division for Intel in Asia Pacific and China, has confirmed that the steering committee established by the Open Data Centre Alliance, which is a key plank of Cloud 2015, 'didn't want to get into the regulatory issues' surrounding cloud computing, and had therefore decided not to admit government members.

While Governments aren't invited to the party, most other major computer users are welcome, and in the week since the ODCA was announced its ranks have swollen from 70 to over 120 according to Mr Fedder who was in Sydney today. 'We thought initially it would be hard to find companies to participate, instead we have been inundated.'

National Australia Bank is one of only a handful of international organisations which are playing a role on the ODCA's steering committee.

This steering committee will manage 19 working parties formed from the ODCA membership charged with exploring a range of issues influencing security, manageability, efficiency and open-ness of clouds. The composition of these working parties is expected to be known by the end of the week according to Mr Fedder.

The first 'roadmaps' regarding cloud deployment are expected to emerge by January. Companies participating in the ODCA working parties will face some pretty onerous workloads, be expected to participate in regular meetings, and attend meetings in the US each quarter.