SIIA Applauds Obama Administration for Helping Federal Agencies Budget for Cloud Computing
For Immediate Release
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SIIA Applauds Obama Administration for Helping Federal Agencies Budget for Cloud Computing
New OMB Guidance Addresses Needs of Today’s World of On-Demand Computing
Washington, D.C. (August 17, 2012) –The Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) Public Sector Innovation Group today applauded the Obama Administration for updating its 2014 budget guidance to address cloud computing. The new section on cloud computing, released Aug. 3 as part of revised guidance for IT investments and e-government (exhibits 53 and 300), will assist federal agencies in making cloud investments part of their 2014 budget requests.
“Cloud computing has become a key priority for the federal government, and we’re pleased to see the cloud-first vision reflected in the OMB’s budget guidelines,” said Michael Hettinger, director of the SIIA Public Sector Innovation Group. “The new guidance is a big step toward making cloud computing a reality for the federal government. It ensures that agencies are able to plan investments in cloud technologies that can reduce costs and more effectively serve citizens. SIIA looks forward to continuing to work with the Administration to bring transformational cloud technologies to the federal marketplace.”
In a June whitepaper, the SIIA Public Sector Innovation Group, which launched in March to help technology firms take advantage of the evolving federal investment in cloud-related technologies, asked the Obama Administration to review the current OMB Exhibit 300 process to ensure its relevancy in today’s world of on-demand computing. The advice was one of five key recommendations aimed at helping federal CIOs and IT companies work together to effectively transition to a new cloud-based environment.
The OMB new guidance calls for agencies to complete an agency cloud computing portfolio as part of the Exhibit 53 process (Exhibit 53C). This section requires agencies to conduct a cloud computing alternatives evaluation, as well as report at the agency level any costs directly attributable to cloud computing implementations, operations or services. Under the guidance, cloud investments are to be reported for prior year, current year and budget year both by deployment model (Public, Private, Community, Hybrid) and service model (PaaS, SaaS and IaaS).
About SIIA
The Software & Information Industry Association (SIIA) is the principal trade association for the software and digital content industry. SIIA provides global services in government relations, business development, corporate education and intellectual property protection to more than 500 leading software and information companies.