First Virtual Meeting to be Held May 18

NEEDHAM, Mass., April 27, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Cloud Standards Customer Council (CSCC), managed by OMG^®, has more than doubled its membership since the announcement of its formation with now more than 91 participating organizations. In the group's first meeting of CSCC participants, there was a call for use cases, the establishment of a Wiki page and an agenda underway for the first formal virtual meeting on Wednesday, May 18. For more information on the CSCC, visit http://www.cloud-council.org/.

"Influencing the development and adoption of cloud standards with a focus on customer requirements will positively impact cloud computing deployment," said Melvin Greer, Senior Fellow and Chief Strategist Cloud Computing, Lockheed Martin; interim chair, CSCC steering committee.

"This has been a very exciting launch with an incredibly motivated group of participants and sponsors. The Cloud Standards Customer Council is the fastest-growing group we've ever had in our 22 years' history," said Richard Mark Soley, Ph.D., chairman and CEO, OMG. "The great reception the announcement had, and the comments I've heard from attendees at our successful first meeting show enormous end-user interest in simplifying access to the cloud."

The Cloud Standards Customer Council is an end user advocacy group dedicated to accelerating cloud's successful adoption, and drilling down into the standards, security and interoperability issues surrounding the transition to the cloud. More than 91 of the world's leading organizations have joined the Cloud Standards Customer Council, with more joining every day. CA Technologies, IBM, Kaavo, Rackspace and Software AG are Founding Sponsors.

The Council is not a standards organization, but will complement existing cloud standards efforts and establish a core set of client–driven requirements to ensure cloud users will have the same freedom of choice, flexibility, and openness they have with traditional IT environments. The Cloud Standards Customer Council is open to all end-user organizations. The group will work to lower the barriers for widespread adoption of Cloud Computing by helping to prioritize key Interoperability issues such as cloud management, reference architecture, hybrid clouds, as well as security and compliance issues.

Elections for the steering committee will take place at the first face-to-face meeting of the CSCC on June 21, 2011 in Salt Lake City, UT. Details will be posted on the CSCC website soon. Membership is free for qualified end-user organizations. The membership application is available at http://www.cloud-council.org/application. Vendors may join as sponsors. For membership or sponsorship questions, contact Ken Berk at ken.berk@omg.org or +1-781-444 0404.

About the Cloud Standards Customer Council

The Cloud Standards Customer Council (CSCC) is an end user advocacy group dedicated to accelerating cloud's successful adoption, and drilling down into the standards, security and interoperability issues surrounding the transition to the cloud. The Council is not a standards organization, but will complement existing cloud standards efforts and establish a core set of client-driven requirements to ensure cloud users will have the same freedom of choice, flexibility, and openness they have with traditional IT environments. The Cloud Standards Customer Council is open to all end-user organizations. CA Technologies, IBM, Kaavo, Rackspace and Software AG are Founding Sponsors. For more information on CSCC, visit http://www.cloud-council.org. The CSCC is managed by OMG^®

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SOURCE OMG (Object Management Group)