Vivek Kundra Adoption of Cloud Computing Can Possibly Expand Data Sharing between Different Governing Sectors
Saturday, January 30th, 2010In March 2009, Vivek Kundra became the first Federal Chief Information Officer of the United States. He is the former Chief Technology Officer for Washington D.C. and former Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Technology for the Commonwealth of Virginia. Today, Vivek Kundra is utilizing his wide-ranging IT expertise to oversee IT investments made by the Obama Administration.
Vivek Kundra is on a mission to preserve the Federal government money when it comes to Information Technology. With that in mind, he is functioning, under a directive from the President, to institute a Web 2.0 administration. He believes the government owes it to its citizens to be more accessible and to make government easily accessible online. Therefore, he has the enormous responsibility of aligning the Information Technology operations across a broad spectrum of Federal government bureaus.
In addition, his ideal is that all data that is not private, or secret for national security reasons, be made available to the public, which is why he launched Data.gov within a few months of taking office. He and President Barack Obama think that this sends a message that the government is an open book looking to inform and serve its citizens. Vivek Kundra also wants to decrease the Federal government dependence on big Information Technology contracts.
This was a fundamental move because instead of spending millions of taxpayer dollars for file servers and monthly fees for document software, cloud computing gave the District of Columbia the ability to create documents free by employing Google. In addition, he acquired extra security and new labels on the program. This only cost the District of Columbia $50-an-employee per year, a superior cost-benefit and efficient use of taxpayers’ dollars. Vivek Kundra said Federal agencies should adopt off-the-shelf technologies and formats that are standard in the private sector. While the CTO for D.C., his office set up the D.C. Digital Public Square. This site is a center for government information. It also provides applications for users so they can integrate that information on maps, timelines, and in other ways.
From cloud computing possibilities to holding government contractors accountable for the services they provide, Vivek Kundra works to make prudent use of the Information Technology budget he controls. He knows that making the correctly Information Technology choices that encompass new mediums and technological advances add to efficient operations in government agencies. His goal is an IT infrastructure that operates within budget parameters, while delivering exceptional value to U. S. citizens.