COUNTRY FOCUS: UK
The effects of data could be extremely
positive for society if exercised to its
full potential. Chris Huggett, Senior Vice
President, EMEA and India at Sungard
AS, tells us how public cloud is creating
new opportunities for digitisation due
to the amount of data the public sector
holds within the UK.
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Why sovereign public cloud
is a game changer for the UK
public sector and its citizens
S
pending £100 million an hour
or £28,000 per second is an
immense responsibility for the
public sector. How it chooses to distribute
an approximately £817 billion annual
budget impacts everyone living in the UK.
Deciding how to squeeze out every bit of
value is crucial, especially as the media and
electorate will mercilessly scrutinise wrong
decisions. Up until recently, most decisions
have been made without the use of new
technology such as Machine Learning and
AI, powered by the public cloud, which
the commercial sector has been doing for
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INTELLIGENTCIO
a decade. This has been due to the legal
limitations of using sensitive data in such
clouds. This is changing, however, and the
public sector now has access to the public
cloud to process and store an increasing
amount of its data. Providing a platform on
which to better manage and use information
will create a launchpad for innovation within
the public sector. It’s an opportunity that will
fundamentally improve the sector’s ability to
provide services to UK citizens. designed to spur the adoption of digitisation
of public sector services. The public sector is
finally set to see the impact that compliant,
cloud-first digital services can deliver. As the
UK government seeks to continually battle
the persisting skills gap present among
technical professionals working to remedy
the public sector’s lethargic grasp of cloud
practices, clearing the regulatory highway will
undoubtedly contribute towards a smoother
transition on to these services.
The introduction of the government’s cloud-
centric procurement framework, G-Cloud, was But there’s one more big hurdle to get
over and that is one of trust. Data-savvy
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