To listen to computer vendors cloud computing is so well entrenched, well it’s almost a last-year issue. Not so according to many Australian enterprises.

A survey of 87 enterprises conducted by IBM in March found that “Among those enterprises already using cloud, many only employed it for testing and development, or to host email applications and data backups”. Many companies also reported lingering concerns about data security and legislative compliance.

Ivan Greguric, enterprise architect for the Stockland property group, which participated in IBM’s review and attended a media conference in Sydney this week said that he believed cloud was still a case of more vendor push than user pull. He said that although Stockland was technically prepared for a move to cloud computing – it has a heavily virtualised environment – it had not adopted any cloud services to date.

Part of the problem he said was to do with the lack of transparency about applications and data held in clouds. He said that a number of software suppliers had approached Stockland detailing their cloud computing services, but when Stockland requested information about the cloud’s location, or its security controls, the software companies refused to provide that level of granular detail.

“They said ‘we will give you our service level agreements (SLAs) but nothing else’. We walked away from them,” said Greguric

Devin Weerasooriya, solution architect for the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank, agreed about the lack of transparency associated with cloud computing, saying that there was often no “clear service delivery promise” from many cloud service vendors.

IBM said that its attitudinal survey, dubbed the Truth Behind the Trends, was intended to separate “reality from rhetoric” about user attitudes to cloud computing. It also surveyed users about their attitudes surrounding mobility and security.

With regard to cloud computing, 80 percent of respondents to the survey said that data sovereignty remained the biggest challenge for organisations considering adopting cloud services. Anton Lak, cloud computing consultant with IBM ANZ, acknowledged that cloud uptake had been slower in Australia than in the US. “It relates to the sovereignty issue. Only in the last 12 months have we seen significant infrastructure in Australia,” he said.

ABOUT LEANNE GRAHAM//

Leanne Graham is the director of SaaS investment company, Cloud Rainmakers, a strategic investment company that helps take SaaS-based businesses to global success. She invested in GeoOP, maker of a mobile workforce solution app, earlier this year and has been appointed as its CEO. Formerly the country manager for Xero, she pioneered its global sales strategy; growing it to 125,000.