Banks quietly shift to the cloud

Warnings from Australia's financial services regulator APRA may have silenced banks and Government agencies from speaking out about their cloud computing plans, nevertheless the regulatory pressure hasn't prevented projects from rolling out.

ANZ Bank were openly named among Salesforce.com's largest clients and I did meet some representatives from another big four bank on the floor that brushed aside concerns about APRA's stance on cloud computing.

Lindsay Armstrong, executive vice president for Salesforce.com in the Asia Pacific region told iTnews that the earliest adopters of the company's platform in Australia were the telecommunications and financial services sectors.

Daniel Burton, senior vice president of global public policy at Salesforce.com told iTnews that both "banks and Government agencies are adopting cloud computing wholesale" even as regulators were raising concerns about data sovereignty and location.

"It's not so much IT departments saying we're going to throw our Oracle or SAP out and bring in Salesforce.com," he said. "What we're instead seeing is shadow IT groups - business units - starting to adopt the likes of Salesforce.com within the companies. At that time the IT department starts seeing what has happened and seeks to legitimise this, and start taking some control.