The UK Government is expected to announce around 250 successful suppliers for its cloud computing procurement initiative, G-Cloud, a source close to the process has told Business Cloud News. An official announcement on winning bids is expected to be provided by Minister for the Cabinet Office, Francis Maude, on 13th February, next Monday.

Click here to read the article.

While SOPA has created plenty of exposure and led to much positive action in the US of late, Ireland still awaits a governmental ruling that could yet have a detrimental effect on the country’s bid to become a centre of cloud computing excellence (and a whole lot more). One of our guest bloggers, Ian Bergin, has been at the centre of the ‘Stop SOPA Ireland’ campaign, and explains why he thinks the potential ruling could prove so disastrous for his country's future online economy.

Click here to read the blog post.

(Business Cloud News)

The Digital Agenda Commissioner for Europe, Neelie Kroes, has announced that the European Commission will give €10m towards a new Cloud Computing Partnership, to try and help aid “flagging economies” on the continent.

Click here to read the article.

Andy Nelson has been appointed the new CIO for UK Government, replacing Joe Harley who announced his retirement late last year. Nelson will retain his position as CIO for the Ministry of Justice alongside the new role, and will be closely involved with the current procurement process for the Government’s G-Cloud initiative.

Click here to read the article.

...After 12 months of intensive discussions and consultations, I am currently preparing the first in a series of concrete announcements related to the European Cloud Computing Strategy. I want Europe to be not only cloud-friendly but cloud-active: the right common rules could enhance cloud development, but the wrong choices on data protection would cut off lots of potential uses and business offerings before they’ve even started. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, I will announce a concrete project aimed at making it easier for buyers – particularly public sector buyers – to cooperate on requirement definitions and possibly pool their resources when procuring Cloud Computing services.

Click here to read Neelie Kroes' complete blog entry.

Spanish banking giant BBVA is switching its 110,000 staff to use Google's range of enterprise software.

The deal is the biggest that the search giant has signed with one company for its cloud-computing services, where software is offered as a service via the internet.

The bank told the BBC it would use Google's tools only for internal communication.

Click here to read the article at BBC News.

In March 2011, the Cabinet Office published Government Cloud Strategy, which set out plans for half of Whitehall's new ICT spending to be spent on cloud services by 2015. The Government is currently going out to tender for its first G-Cloud offerings and has attracted a lot of interest.  The following outlines the position:

Details of the OJEU are available here.

Procurement documents can be viewed on our eSourcing portal here.

  G-Cloud short guide [248KB]

  Supplier questions and answers regarding the procurement Published 15 November 2011 [156KB]

Parts 3 and 4 of the Cloud Legal Project’s 'Cloud of Unknowing' series of papers on data protection law aspects of cloud computing are now available.

Click here for Part 3 - Data Protection Jurisdiction and Cloud Computing - When are Cloud Users and Providers Subject to EU Data Protection Law?

Click here for part 4 - Data Export in Cloud Computing - How Can Personal Data Be Transferred Outside the EEA?

2. EVENTS

The Cloud Legal Project is presenting a series of free evening lectures in London in October/November in conjunction with, and kindly hosted by, the Institute of Advanced Legal  Studies in Russell Square. For more information, including on registration, click here. The poster regarding the events is here.

Click here for the Cloud Legal Project's answers in response to the European Commission's consultation on cloud computing, aimed at potential cloud users (eg barriers to adoption) as well as actual cloud users and cloud providers.

2. EVENTS

Kuan Hon will be speaking on "Every Cloud has a Data Protection Lining" at Amberhawk's Autumn 2011 Data Protection Update. Click here for more information.

A reminder that the Cloud Legal Project is presenting a series of free evening lectures in London in October/November. These events are to be held in conjunction with, and kindly hosted by, the Institute of Advanced Legal  Studies in Russell Square. For more information, including on registration, click here.  The poster regarding the events is here - please feel free to put this up at your organisations if you wish.

3. NEGOTIATED CONTRACTS 

We are continuing our research on negotiated cloud contracts, and are still open to offers of possible interviewees to consider, particularly cloud customers and solutions providers. All interviews are on a confidential no-names basis and only anonymised results will be published.

4. PUBLICATIONS 

Our research on standard cloud contract terms has been published as an article "Contracts for clouds: comparison and analysis of the Terms and Conditions of cloud computing services", in International Journal of Law and Information Technology (2011) 19 (3): 187-223. doi:10.1093/ijlit/ear005, published online 20 July 2011 (subscriber-only access)