CIOs describe starter cloud efforts that are designed to minimize security and legal risks
By Patrick Thibodeau | Computerworld.com
Computerworld – The road map for expanding enterprise use of cloud computing is being drawn by IT executives like Mark Stone, CIO at Safety-Kleen Systems Inc.
Safety-Kleen, an environmental services company with about 4,200 employees, has turned to cloud technology to run 15% of its applications, mostly for functions like CRM and travel management, Stone said. About 35% of the company’s application portfolio, including its general ledger systems, could be hosted externally within three years, he added.
“I can go to a variety of [software-as-a-service] providers and put in software that’s every bit as functionally rich as anything I’ve developed on-site,” without having to worry about the upkeep of an IT infrastructure, Stone said at Computerworld’s Storage Networking World conference earlier this month in Grapevine, Texas.