GE adopted a go-slow approach to cloud computing, but has made big efforts and explorations into the possibilities for cloud processing. Those efforts are organized into a 3-year project to implement technologies that provide flexibility, automation and manageability.

Many of the efforts involve virtualization and virtualization management, ultimately extending into a capacity to manage virtual machines as a pool of resource,s rather than individually. This is the basis of GE’s exploration of its own private cloud capacity, including an examination of technologies and the value they can deliver.

But, GE’s exploration also extends to public clouds. For example, GE has been testing Google’s Gmail and productivity software for nearly 2 years, and is moving to WebEx for web conferencing. More recently, GE hedged their Google bets by adding Zoho online applications for web-based spreadsheet editing and storage (while still retaining Microsoft Excel).

In the words of GE’s CTO Greg Simpson, storing GE data on Google servers is “probably our biggest stumbling block to going bigger with Google.” In addition, GE has embraced Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) by purchasing Aravo’s Supplier Information Management (SIM) SaaS product.

According to GE’s CIO Gary Reiner, the fact that SIM was a hosted solution was immaterial to GE’s decision. They needed a supply chain coordination system to support 100,000 users and 500,000 suppliers in six languages. Aravo’s SIM is helping to satisfy that need.

But GE is not immune to security worries about its data. GE claims to be confident that their supplier data is secure outside their own firewalls with Aravo. According to Reiner, that confidence is justified by one word: “Audits.”

GE chose to reduce the transparency and digital trust deficits of cloud processing by using private clouds, and by applying the timeless technique of independent (and constant) inspection and auditing.

— From "Digital Trust In The Cloud," by CSC's Ron Knode

 

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