EuroCloud gathers Europe’s first ever SaaS and cloud services community
EuroCloud expands Europe’s most influential cloud computing network of organisations to push SaaS revolution
EuroCloud, Europe’s first ever SaaS and cloud services business community, has launched today. EuroCloud is a European network of local SaaS and cloud computing communities from Denmark, UK, Belgium, Finland, Luxembourg, France and Spain, including vendors and industry experts. It is aiming at developing the next generation of added value applications. EuroCloud plans to create further local communities in Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, and Sweden, and will set up its headquarters in Brussels. Through its diverse membership, EuroCloud will promote cloud computing in Europe, including current state of the markets and future innovations, and will become a critical exchange platform across the different continents.
Led by Pierre-José Billotte, President and Founder of the French ASP Forum, with a team of SaaS & cloud computing players from the UK, Denmark, Finland, Belgium, Luxembourg and Spain, EuroCloud gathers together leading SaaS vendors, enablers, integrators and industry experts to share best practice and expand their businesses across the continent.
ASP Forum (France) was the first local association to support the EuroCloud initiative, and today it becomes EuroCloud France – bringing 70 French members to the EuroCloud network. Already, EuroCloud has created local communities in the UK, Denmark, Belgium, Luxembourg, France and Spain and is actively recruiting members. The objective is to replicate this initial success by expanding the network to further countries to achieve 20 EuroCloud regional organisations and around 500 members by 2014.
To develop EuroCloud, Pierre-José Billotte has been closely working with a European team including cloud players, experts and analysts. This European team has been instrumental in driving the project further as helped coordinate the creation of the regional associations:
• Phil Wainewright (Procullux Ventures) – EuroCloud UK coordinator
• Anders Trolle-Schultz (Saas-it Consult) – EuroCloud Denmark coordinator
• Charles Convent (Odyssee Mobile) – EuroCloud Belgium coordinator
• Amal Choury (E-Kenz) – EuroCloud Luxembourg coordinator
• Pierre-José Billotte (Sourcia) – EuroCloud France coordinator
• Rodolfo Lomascolo (ipsCA) – EuroCloud Spain coordinator
• Trond Neergaard (Cloudberry) – EuroCloud Finland coordinator
The EuroCloud concept
Pierre-José Billotte came up with the concept and created a strategic plan including a clear vision of what this initiative could bring to the whole IT industry. Following the launch, the regional associations (shown below) will be driving initiatives supporting local business issues while exchanging information with the other markets via the European central board.
EuroCloud’s launch is already supported by major companies in Europe and in the US. These are called European Launch Promoters (ELP) and are: Amazon Web Services, Cloudberry Associates, Cloudmore, Compubase, Dassault Systèmes, E-Kenz, Emailvision, Esker, Huddle, INES, ipsCA, McAfee, Microsoft Corporation, Mimecast, MrTed, NTRglobal, Odyssee Mobile, Oodrive, OpSource, Panda Security, Procullux
Ventures, Qualys, RunMyProcess, Saas-it Consult, salesforce.com, Servoy, STS Group, SuccessFactors and Twinfield. ELPs are all present in multiple markets and were selected based on the European scope of their business.
Across Europe, organisations by the thousands are adopting cloud computing to grow their businesses and rid their balance sheets of expensive and cumbersome software that doesn’t respond quickly enough to their changing needs. We are excited to see groups like EuroCloud forming to drive further adoption of this model in Europe, added Woodson Martin, VP Marketing, EMEA, salesforce.com.
“I’m supporting the EuroCloud initiative in the UK because it represents a tremendous opportunity to promote best practices and business benefits of SaaS and cloud services across Europe. Cloud computing is a major force for aligning IT with business requirements, delivering results faster and with greater visibility and transparency to actual IT costs. EuroCloud will raise public awareness of these benefits and accelerate adoption, helping European businesses remain competitive in today’s globally connected economy,” added Phil Wainewright, independent analyst on emerging software industry trends at Procullux Ventures.
Tim Pickard, CMO at London-based SaaS company Mimecast said, “The relevance of SaaS is now very apparent to IT directors which is driving more and larger businesses to adopt SaaS in their IT delivery models. Time to implement, time to benefit, resourcing and focus are all benefits of cloud computing; vendors will truly add value by providing integrated services to customers. EuroCloud will provide a platform to promote cloud service and to help educate the market to speed adoption. In addition, vendors will have a forum to act more collaboratively to further develop services and go to market strategies.”
“Cloud computing is more than just a buzz phrase. It is here to stay and is expected to take an increasing share of total IT spending worldwide. The creation of EuroCloud is a major step for the European development of cloud computing. For example, it will find investment opportunities in start-up companies in Europe that develop solutions for hybrid cloud, which is expected to experience increased demand over the coming years,” said Dan Yachin, research director, IDC EMEA Emerging Technologies.
EuroCloud will increase business exchanges between the different European countries. As the whole industry is shifting to cloud computing, EuroCloud’s goals are to become the first European cloud ecosystem to boost cloud development across Europe, while becoming the European platform for business exchange with other continents.
According to IDC, worldwide IT spending on cloud services will grow almost threefold, reaching US$44.2 billion, by 2013 (IDC eXchange, "IDC’s New IT Cloud Services Forecast: 2009-2013",
http://blogs.idc.com/ie/, October 5, 2009).
For further information, please visit: www.eurocloud.org/
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