On
September 27, 2012 the European Commission publicly announced their strategy
aimed at making sure Europe becomes competitive in the cloud computing
industry. The Commission wants to see the cloud expand extensively in Europe in
the hope that it will drive individual businesses and national economies.
According
to sources, the EU has funded an open source project known as OPTIMUS to
provide web professionals the tools necessary to build, deploy, and maintain
applications in the cloud. Having a standardised toolkit is one of the things
experts point to as a necessity to make the Commission's plans reality.
If
everything comes together as the Commission envisions Europe's lagging cloud
computing industry should, in due course, be competitive with the United
States. Although cloud computing in Europe is growing, it still lags far behind
America for a number of reasons.
Economic Goals for the European Cloud
The
report released by the European Commission suggests the possibility of adding
as many as 2.5 million jobs throughout Europe as more companies begin utilizing
cloud computing for daily business operations. The report further suggests a
boost to Europe's GDP of €160 billion.
However,
before all of the monetary goals can be realised there are some digital
infrastructure problems that need to be resolved. Right now the shared hosting
model is what dominates Europe because there are so few standards in place for
the cloud. Security risks are also a legitimate concern among potential cloud
customers.
According
to Neelie Kroes, EU Commissioner for Digital Agenda, the Commission needs to
take additional steps to increase the acceptance of cloud computing in Europe.
She told a news conference in Brussels there needs to be a "single set of
rules across Europe" and the "perceived risks of cloud
computing" must be dealt with directly.
Only Time Will Tell
Only time
will tell whether or not the European Commission's actions achieve real,
positive results. At first glance it appears as though it is a step in the
right direction. Especially encouraging is the Commissions support of the
OPTIMUS project. More than one expert has already made it clear that
open-source is the future of the Internet, so getting on board is a wise move.
On the
other hand, security concerns and a lack of standardisation are a real problem.
Despite the Commission's actions there is speculation as to whether or not they
can pull this off. After all, aren't Greece and Spain still on the verge of
economic collapse despite the best efforts by the European Union to stave it
off?
The
problem with government intervention in these sorts of things is the reality
that what may start out as a good idea with the best of intentions quickly
turns political. And when political aspirations enter the picture things
quickly devolve and become useless.
Here's
hoping cloud computing in Europe catches up to the United States and becomes
competitive. The more competition, the better. But if Europe doesn't succeed
there will always be the question of whether or not the European Commission was
the cause of the failure.
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