Texas Cloud Computing Lessons Learned

Cloud Computing as a Strategic Asset

By G C Network | April 30, 2009

For some reason, this week seems to have more in it than most. While the steady stream of briefing request seem to be increasing, the post briefing discussions also seem…

Vivek Kundra: “Engage the American People in their Daily Digital Lives”

By G C Network | April 25, 2009

Today I attended a very impressive talk by the Federal CIO, Mr. Vivek Kundra at a Northern Virginia Technology Council Public Policy event. His open and “matter of fact” approach…

McKinsey vs. Booz Allen Hamilton !

By G C Network | April 21, 2009

A community skirmish reminiscent of the recent “manifestogate” has apparently erupted around the McKinsey & Co. report “Clearing the air on cloud computing“. Booz Allen Hamilton Principals Mike Cameron and…

Oracle Buys Sun!!

By G C Network | April 20, 2009

Swooping in from nowhere, Oracle buys Sun for $7.4B!! “This morning, the companies announced that they’d struck a deal worth $7.4 billion or $5.6 billion net of Sun’s cash and…

Aneesh Chopra Nominated For Federal CTO

By G C Network | April 20, 2009

Although Aneesh Chopra is a new name for most, he is well know in Virginia as Governor Tim Kaine’s Secretary of Technology. For the Commonwealth, he was charged with leading…

Could Cloud Computing Cost More?

By G C Network | April 16, 2009

In a recent conference, analyst William Forrest says that large companies could end up paying more than twice as much by using cloud based services. According to a Forbes.com report,…

Cisco’s Cloud Computing Strategy

By G C Network | April 10, 2009

A couple of weeks ago, Krishna Sankar provided a glimpse into Cisco’s cloud computing strategy in a presentation titled “A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Inter-Cloud” . The presentation outlined the…

NCOIC and Cloud Computing: An Update

By G C Network | April 8, 2009

As the NCOIC gets it’s arms around this new paradigm, the Cloud Computing Working Group has focused on establishing a roadmap for providing value to the industry. Using the established…

SUN-IBM Talks Breakdown

By G C Network | April 6, 2009

As reported in multiple sources today, including Reuters, Sun has apparently rejected a purchase offer by IBM. “Shares of Sun Microsystems Inc tumbled 22.5 percent after it rejected a $7…

Former DoT CIO on Cloud Computing

By G C Network | April 3, 2009

Last month, former Transportation Department CIO Dan Mintz offered his views on cloud computing to Eric Chabrow, Managing Editor of Government Information Security. According to Mr. Mintz, there is currently…

Late last week  the Texas Department of Information Resources (DIR) released an important whitepaper that reviewed it’s multi-year Pilot Texas Cloud Offering (PTCO). This project was designed to allow a small group of agencies to choose a virtual private cloud-based infrastructure as a service from a marketplace of service providers made available by a cloud broker. For this project, Texas DIR selected Gravitant and it’s cloudMatrix technology. Gravitant’s self-service web portal, Texas Cloud Self-Service Portal (TCSP), allowed participating agencies to manage and support all phases of the engagement from solutioning to provisioning, operations and capacity management, and decommissioning. Gravitant also provided extensive architecture and solution support. Gravitant, as the cloud broker, established, negotiated, and governed the reseller agreements with the individual cloud service providers. They maintained a catalog of services, line items, and prices associated with each provider, which enabled them to facilitate cloud provisioning across multiple providers—a key feature for government agencies.

This approach was selected as it maximized the opportunity to produce the broadest spectrum of experiences for customers. The cloudMatrix software helped to normalize the multiple services available, creating an “apples-to-apples” comparison in pricing and functionality as much as possible. In addition, this solution provided a single, unified web interface for end users to design, procure, provision, monitor, and govern the services. The PTCO allowed DIR and the pilot agencies to a gain a greater understanding of cloud infrastructure offerings for state government and document options and issues with provider selection, pricing, access security, data security, credentialing, provisioning time frames, service levels, service remedy options, terms of use, billing models, interoperability, mobility, scalability, capacity management, provider compliance, and monitoring and licensing.

As far as I know, the PTCO represents the only proven operational model of the cloud brokerage concept deployed within a government setting. Among the lessons learned, this project showed that the use of a cloud broker can:

  • Help government agencies screen their applications for cloud feasibility and prioritizing cloud migrations accordingly;
  • Address the challenges of cloud model comparisons due to the variables in product offerings, including the business models, service levels, and package inclusions;
  • Translate capacity requirements into provider line items, thus allowing for accurate estimation of cloud cost;
  • Provide a cloud service order review or approval workflow facility, a function not normally provided by cloud service providers; and
  • Provide a means to regulate payment across multiple government entities.

If you are interested in learning more about the results of this pilot project, download the complete report at https://www.slideshare.net/kvjacksn/pilot-texas-cloud-offering.

NJVC is partnering with Gravitant to bring this advance cloud brokerage technology to the federal marketplace.

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