Cloud strategy baffles govt IT managers

Despite the growing demand for cloud services, many government IT managers are unsure of their organisation's overall cloud strategy and the resources available to purchase and implement cloud services, a survey of top IT officials across US federal, state and local government revealed, GCN reports.

Government organisations that are spending on cloud computing tend to be those that have first dealt with foundation issues such as enterprise and services-oriented architectures, according to the new IDC Government Insights report.

The study measured the progress of cloud solutions at government agencies while also examining the related enterprise architecture needs.

More than a third of the respondents lacked knowledge of cloud budgeting, which indicates that employee outreach clearly is necessary to boost enterprise-wide understanding of cloud strategies and budgets, the reports states.

IDC found that, across the US government, 90% of respondents do expect cloud services to have a significant impact on infrastructure, Tech Eye.net writes.

It was local government respondents who were most skeptical about cloud computing. Some 14.7% were skeptical about the cloud, dismissing it as not important at all. Of all those surveyed, 15.2% said they would allot between one and 10% of their IT budget to the cloud.

In the US, the government agencies who were included in the survey leant largely towards big IT vendors over smaller, speciality providers.