Dr Steve Hodgkinson, Research Director, IT, Asia-Pacific

Cloud services policies are being developed and iterated in all jurisdictions. Having reviewed a number of draft policies in recent months, we believe policy-makers need to work harder to create a level playing field for cloud services adoption, mindful of the potential for a type I procurement error (buying a “bad” cloud service) or a type II procurement error (buying a “bad” in-house, shared, or outsourced service, when a cloud service would have been better).

Policies tend to be biased toward avoiding type I errors, so even in policies that are well-intended the playing field is tilted away from cloud services. Type II errors can, however, create worse outcomes, arising from missed or delayed opportunities for productivity improvement and innovation in policy and service delivery.

Innovation-minded governments need to level the playing field

The logic of government cloud computing policy usually starts with …