By Stuart McKee, Microsoft State & Local Government National Technology Officer
On Tuesday, I had the opportunity to participate in the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce’s annual CitySummit, a collaborative event that brings together thought leaders and innovators to create solutions for a critical issue impacting the business community. As the birthplace of the high-tech industry and home to some of the world’s largest technology companies, the San Francisco Bay Area is at the cutting edge of so many emerging industries, from social media to the green economy.
At this year’s summit, speakers and panelists focused on economic resurgence, job growth and "what's next" for the San Francisco’s most vibrant growth industries, including the role that cloud computing and other key technologies will play. My colleague Stan Freck, Director of Cloud Computing at Microsoft, contributed to a panel discussion with other industry representatives about cloud adoption. Stan presented a compelling argument that Microsoft has always been the leader in the market for businesses, governments, and consumers moving to the Cloud and actually built the secure platform that many competitors seek to imitate.
In addition to hearing Stan, I also had the distinct pleasure of personally introducing Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Like the two governors I have had the privilege of serving under (current Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke and four-term Governor Cecil D. Andrus, who also served as Secretary of the Interior), Governor Schwarzenegger has a personal and profound commitment to public service.
Governor Schwarzenegger is also a leader who gets it – he understands that innovation takes entrepreneurs, that government services depend on private-sector growth and that big problems require big solutions. Like the Governor, Microsoft shares a commitment to workforce development, job creation, and building a stronger economy in California and the Bay Area. We look forward working with public officials like Governor Schwarzenegger to develop solutions that address critical issues and by playing a significant role in the crucial area of public-private collaboration.
We’ll post video from this week’s event in an upcoming blog entry, but in the meantime, you can view footage of the Governor’s remarks here.
By Andy Pitman, Microsoft Public Sector Industry Solution Manager
Georgia’s Department of Administrative Services (DOAS) is responsible for billions of dollars annually of purchasing for the state government. Given this large financial responsibility, the DOAS leadership team is always seeking to improve processes and efficiency. Over the last year they created the Spend Management Analytics solution to improve visibility into—and lower—overall state spending. The project stemmed from Georgia’s 2004 Commission for a New Georgia which outlined a variety of operational improvements, including procurement practices. This led to the creation of a static Spend Cube which became the basis for the new Spend Management Analytics solution.
With the goals of extending the static Spend Cube to keep it dynamically up to date and adding business intelligence capabilities, the Spend Management Analytics solution was a joint effort among Georgia DOAS, the Pew Center on the States (a division of The Pew Charitable Trusts that identifies and advances effective solutions to critical issues facing states), and Microsoft. In today’s challenging economic times, one of the most critical issues states face is reduced funding, and this has resulted a greater need for spending awareness and cost control.
The project outcome was a solution that provides near real time information regarding Georgia’s collective procurement spending, with business intelligence capabilities that enable reporting and drill-downs into spending pattern details. Ultimately, this enables the state to optimize expenditures, lower costs, and get the best services the market offers.
The solution framework can be ported to other state and local governments, and both the Georgia DOAS leaders and Pew Center on the States leaders are available to answer questions other government officials’ questions. Additionally, Microsoft solution team experts are available to explain how this project’s business intelligence capabilities may be applied to other government financial data scenarios. Check out the Spend Management in the State of Georgia whitepaper for an in-depth explanation of the project and solution.
By Kristin Bockius, State & Local Government Social Media Marketing Manager
By partnering with Microsoft to build an improved energy management system, my home State of Missouri is saving $35 million a year through the integration of all of their building management systems. In this video, Colin Nurse, State and Local Government Chief Technology Office, Microsoft US Public Sector, talks about why facilities energy management is an important focus area for Microsoft and how SharePoint and SQL can be a part of an overall solution to reduce energy costs.
By Matt Miszewski—Microsoft World Wide General Manager for Government
I had the honor of meeting with some of the ICT leadership of CentreLink yesterday from the Australian central government. Centrelink does some incredible things down under and it was an honor to host them a bit today to talk about what we can do together to make their ICT operations even more efficient than it is today and unlock some of the magic of software for their citizens.
It was invigorating to talk with these folks about the nature of ICT as a profession in the public sector and how we all have an opportunity to push ICT as a strategic policy lever inside government. To see the focus on this team to manage efficiency for laudable reasons (to allow the Australian Government to better accomplish its mission to create safer streets, a cleaner environment and a more sustainable education system) was a reminder of how noble the cause of public sector ICT management can be for all of us.
For an organization with charges to care for Australians dealing with the need to be made whole after natural disasters such as the flooding in the Flooding from the Victorian Floods this March, provide services to folks relocating to and from the country, enabling benefit recipients to pay their bills digitally and so on, it was impressive to see the dedication of this team in making sure the infrastructure was secure and efficient and that they had a keen eye on providing platforms for citizens to benefit from at the same time.
The video is just one example of them going that extra mile to ensure that citizens have digital access as they push the government to commit fully to a Government 2.0 vision for Australia. Computerworld covered some of their other Gov20 efforts earlier this year.
To learn more about Microsoft and ICT (Information and Communications Technologies) in the public sector, visit Matt's blog Fixing Potholes.
Last month, we wrote about how Texas cities are turning to Microsoft’s Business Online Productivity Suite (BPOS) to take advantage of the flexibility and savings of the cloud while meeting their need for proven enterprise-grade capabilities and reliability. And as more and more state and local governments explore their options when it comes to cloud, we are launching the Microsoft Government Cloud Applications Center, a central location where government customers can find Microsoft partners and solutions to support their cloud computing needs.
The new Government Cloud Applications Center enables customers to quickly find partner cloud applications that fit their business needs, determine compatibility with existing IT infrastructure, contact information, and links to relevant product websites. Customers can easily search by partner, solution, or technology and review similar partner solutions and capabilities.
For partners, the Government Cloud Applications Center provides the ability to showcase solutions and services that are based on Microsoft cloud computing technologies, including online services like the Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) as well as the Windows Azure Platform. Partners will also benefit from further exposure of their services by linking existing profiles to this central site for government customer as well as other public sector web properties.
As we like to say, “We’re all in” when it comes to the cloud, and part of this means helping our government customers understand all the options they have before they make the decision to move to a cloud-based solution. Our public sector partners can help us to do just that by getting your profile listed on PinPoint and in the Government Cloud Applications Center. For more information, visit www.pinpoint.com/getlisted.
By Richard McKinney, Microsoft State & Local Government Technology Advisor
These are tough times. The worst economy in a generation challenges all of us. CIO’s and IT Directors in the public sector are facing mandatory budget cuts of 5, 10, 15% or even worse, cuts that often reach far beyond operational costs to staffing levels, the most painful cuts of all. Ironically, at the same time the pressure is on IT to deliver more value to the government employees and citizens they serve. So doing more with less is the “between a rock and a hard place” that we find ourselves in today. For those of us who care about information technology in the public sector and have made it our life’s work, these tough times should not and I believe will not deter us or knock us back. Instead they present both a historic challenge and a promising blue-sky opportunity for us to find a new approach to IT. And that opportunity, that new approach, without a doubt is cloud computing.
Cloud computing is not a new invention or a new software program. Rather it is an evolution of the hardware, software, platforms and networks we have collectively been working so hard on for many years. The current model of build data centers, buy hardware, install software, connect locally with networks and globally to the Internet has served us well to date. We have done great things to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of government and the lives of the citizens we all serve and call our neighbors. But now these same technologies and their ever-accelerating maturation brings to us this new opportunity to rethink how we build these networks and how we deliver future software solutions to our governments and in turn our neighbors. Instead of having to build these complex computing infrastructures independent of one another and essentially reinventing large parts of the wheel from one government to the next, we can now use cloud computing to construct an alternative approach. We can begin to consider how essential elements of our computer operations can be delivered as hosted services, the building blocks for this new approach called cloud computing.
Microsoft has always been at the forefront of the computer revolution. From the birth of the PC to the explosion of the Internet, our software has powerfully contributed to this historic transformation of the world we live in. And we continue to lead the way with cloud computing. Over the years, as the Internet matured and in anticipation of this cloud computing transformation, Microsoft has wisely invested billions of dollars and countless more hours of imagination, planning and plain old hard work in this effort to re-invent the delivery of software and solutions. What began as Hotmail in 1996 has grown and grown, leading us to where we have carefully transformed our unmatched lineup of enterprise-ready and powerfully interoperable software to deliver them as services across the Internet. We have built massive, secure and energy efficient data centers around the world so that we are now positioned to bring to our customers that same great software, infrastructure and platforms we have always sold as on-premise offerings but now lead with as hosted services. And the scale of this infrastructure and the efficiency of this service provisioning means that the cost of computing can be reduced significantly, in some cases by orders of magnitude. And this brings me back to my original point that the current economic crisis calls for a new approach to IT. This is our time to change the way we do business. We have at Microsoft. We’re all in.
The possibilities are endless. Moving from the traditional model to hosted services will free up precious IT resources, both financial and human, to reinvigorate our primary mission of bringing mission-critical and sometimes life-saving solutions to the governments we serve. The cost savings from hosted cloud services will do much more than just help close our budgetary gaps. They will seed our imaginations. We will be able to explore new possibilities around shared services. We will be able to retire once and for all (RIP) the legacy systems and applications that under serve our needs, slow us down, steal our budgets and consume unnecessary human resources. State, city and county governments will be able to work together on new regional alliances and new models of service delivery for their citizens and customers. Small to mid-size governments, unable to stand up the costly and complex IT infrastructure required that puts many technologies just out of reach because of their limited staffing and budget resources, will find themselves able to procure and deliver the same enterprise-ready services and solutions that the larger governments have always been able to tackle. This will stop and begin to reverse the ever-increasing digital divide between larger and smaller jurisdictions. Instead of being tied down by the constant demand of complex infrastructure management, IT shops will be able to turn more of their attention to the value-add business applications that solve real problems and produce increased productivity, which at the end of the day is the true measure of an IT shop’s effectiveness and value to the organization. The cost of disaster recovery and the constant threat of data loss will be greatly diminished as this will be built into the hosted service as a basic feature. IT shops will enjoy the obvious benefit of having evergreen software services, freeing them from the constant upgrade/don’t upgrade decision cycle. Security certifications and measures that are totally beyond the ability of local IT shops to build and maintain will be baked in. On and on and on, the possibilities far outweigh the arguments of those who would lock us into our outdated and thread-bare habits.
So again, at Microsoft, we say “We’re all in.” And I know that what Microsoft really means by “We” is your team and our team, working side-by-side to build this new software world and imaging all of the possibilities together, as one team. Thanks for this opportunity and time to share my thoughts with you.
*Note – Richard’s past experience is from the public side - Chief Information Officer at Metropolitan Govt of Nashville/Davidson County, Director of Information Systems at Tennessee General Assembly and Assistant Commissioner for Administration at Tennessee Department of General Services.
When Microsoft looks at unified communications, we address all of the different touchpoints and mechanisms of communication, including video, voice, instant messaging, SharePoint collaboration, and other means. Governments are trying to increase the way they leverage social media and increase the amount of teleworking while reducing their costs and carbon footprint. And this goal is built into Microsoft Unified Communications whether you want to leverage the technology in the cloud, on premise, or a combination of both.
Kent Cunningham, Business Development Manager for Emerging Technologies, Microsoft Public Sector, discusses how Unified Communications enables telework and COOP in state and local government.
As I’ve written before on the Bright Side of Government, transparency and open government are foundational elements of democracy, and recent advances in technology have greatly raised citizen’s expectations for access to their government. I’m pleased to see that the vision of “Information at your fingertips” espoused by Microsoft co-founder and chairman Bill Gates is indeed becoming a reality for citizens and their relationship with governments. One real world example is launch of HeyGov! for San Francisco. HeyGov! is a SaaS offering from Microsoft Partner, ISC, that provides a new and engaging way for citizens and governments to communicate more effectively in the Web 2.0 era.
The City of San Francisco, has adopted HeyGov! to give their citizens a new way to submit service requests (i.e., potholes, graffiti, street cleaning) to the City’s 311 Department. In addition to supporting the 311 service request intake, the interactive mapping application is an open government transparency solution for citizens to monitor and analyze service requests logged into the city’s 311 non-emergency reporting system. In the past, local residents could use phone, Twitter and/or an online form to track a service request, but they were limited to seeing only whether their specific request was “open” or “closed.” Now San Francisco 311 allows citizens not only to check the status of their own requests but actually view all relevant service requests (including those submitted by others) on an interactive map in relation to projects in their own neighborhood.
Here’s how it works: The service requests are exposed through an API based on Open 311 standards that can be integrating with a government’s existing CRM system. Built on the Windows Azure platform, the HeyGov! solution takes advantage of virtually unlimited storage and processing power of the cloud and provides the ability to quickly address service requests and implement updates even during peak times. “HeyGov! represents a new business model where openness, collaboration and innovation are at the center. We see Open311 API as just the start of a much larger effort to create APIs for many more areas of government service delivery,” says Chris Vein, City & County of San Francisco CIO. The first adopter of HeyGov!, the City of Miami has already starting using the solution in other departments including Public Safety for reporting code enforcement violations.
HeyGov! getting adopted by Miami and San Francisco is a prime example of governments and businesses working together to share their innovation freely and represent an intentional effort to collaborate on building interoperable solutions that can be implemented easily by other state and local governments. In fact, San Francisco has also moved their API from just being available for testing to being deployed as a live, in-production web service, and San Francisco and Washington D.C. recently came together to agree on and fully interoperate with a new Open311 GeoReport v2 specification.
But there’s more good news for Californians. With over 400 data sources and 100 million records online, the State of California has made available vast amounts of public data relating to all facets of state government. Through the Apps for Californians contest, California and partners like Microsoft are inviting application developers to leverage these public data sets to develop innovative applications, visualizations and mash-ups that empower residents and businesses with improved access to government information and services and promote collaboration between the state, local governments and non-governmental partners. We are looking forward seeing how your creativity and innovations improve access to government information and invited to submit your application from now until the contest closes on August 27, 2010.
For more information on the contest, including terms and conditions, please visit the Apps for Californians website. For more information about how to bring HeyGov! solution to your city, please visit HeyGov.com. The official press release can be found here.
By Gail Thomas-Flynn, Microsoft US State & Local Government Vice President
States and cities across the US are facing many common issues, and given current budgetary constraints, improving efficiency while reducing costs is top of mind right now. At the same time, governments are telling us that they want to enhance their technology delivery service and improve the way they interact with their citizens. With these objectives in mind, two Texas cities—the City of Plano and the City of Buda—set out to choose a solution that provides the flexibility and savings of the cloud without sacrificing their need for proven enterprise-grade capabilities and reliability. Here are their stories:
Plano
A fast-growing city of 256,000 that’s home to a number of Fortune 500 companies, the City of Plano’s IT organization supports 2,500 city employees across 26 departments. In 2008, civic leaders in this forward-thinking city began to brainstorm ways to increase the flexibility of their technology infrastructure and also lower their total cost of ownership. The city was using a number of on-premise Microsoft Office solutions, but they wanted to add a number of collaboration and live chat capabilities to streamline communications and allow employees to work remotely.
Plano decided to migrate to the Microsoft Business Online Productivity Suite (BPOS) to provide city employees with simplified yet comprehensive online access to e-mail, calendars, tasks, contacts, and shared documents using Microsoft Exchange Online and Office Outlook Web Access. The city is also using Microsoft SharePoint Online to provide web-based tools for collaboration and content management. For example, the city’s police officers can check their department’s intranet site from their vehicles or from a community substation to view updates to policies, minutes from recent meetings, and best practices information.
Buda
Located in a rapidly growing area outside of Austin, the City of Buda had concerns similar to Plano’s but also needed to replace an e-mail system that was overburdened and inefficient, causing significant productivity loss for city employees. The city evaluated a several e-mail system options—including Google and other cloud providers—before deciding that Microsoft BPOS was the best solution for lowering costs while increasing functionality. Working with our partner ISHIR, the city deployed Microsoft BPOS, including Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, Office Live Meeting, and Office Communications Online. Buda has increased their productivity levels significantly and now can archive its most critical information in a single location where all authorized personnel can easily access it.
The City of Plano and the City of Buda have joined the more than 500 state and local governments in the US that currently use Microsoft Online Services. From Plano to Newark, NJ, cities of all sizes are finding that BPOS allows them to enjoy proven enterprise-class software and realize measurable cost savings.
For more information about Plano and Buda, check out the full Plano case study and the full Buda case study.
Guest post by Dan Kasun, Senior Director, Microsoft Developer and Platform Evangelism
Over the past weekend, Microsoft announced support for Code for America at a dinner event in Seattle attended by Tim O’Reilly, CEO of O’Reilly Media, as well as local officials like Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn and City Councilmember Bruce Harrell. Code for America has embarked on a program to connect city governments with developers, and to foster strong collaboration and sharing between cities on technology solutions.
We believe that this type of initiative can help drive innovative applications in the city government space, help grow the workforce of qualified developers, and help drive efficiency through reuse and sharing of best practices and solutions. Here at Microsoft, we see the issues facing city governments and we believe that the power of software can help governments overcome these challenges and succeed in their missions. However, there needs to be a strong base of developers who understand not only technology, but also government issues, infrastructure, organization, systems, and needs.
Microsoft is demonstrating our support for Code for America by committing to a $50,000 contribution. We have also agreed to help provide developer skills training to the Code for America Fellows, as well as technical and architectural guidance for the planned solutions in the target cities of Boston, Philadelphia, DC, Seattle, and Boulder.
To learn more about Microsoft's involvement in Code for America, read Dan's full post on the Microsoft on The Issues blog.
For a new government employee, there is an expectation of “24-7” social connectivity, and the new version of Microsoft Office allows users to integrate their social networks into their productivity tools in new ways on an intuitive user interface. Microsoft Sales Solution Professional Matthew Lonergan explains how Office 2010 and SharePoint work together to promote seamless interaction between colleagues, constituents, friends and family.
For more information about Office 2010, check out my earlier Bright Side blog post on the reasons I like Windows 7 & Office 2010.
Last month we launched the Microsoft State and Local Azure Applications Development Contest for state and local government partners. Today we want to remind everyone that the contest is an excellent opportunity for all of our partners to showcase their development skills by creating a Windows Azure-based application that meets real needs of government customers. I hope that many of our partners will take advantage of the scalability and interoperability of Windows Azure to build mission-critical applications that state and local governments can adopt with little cost.
One of the best ways to help state and local governments take advantage of cloud-based computing is by building applications that help to reduce cost while improving citizen access to government services or help to present useful information. Of course, the contest is also a great chance for partners to obtain recurring revenue by developing subscription-based applications, reach new market segments, and gain exposure for your solutions. In fact, the winning partners will have their applications demonstrated by Microsoft sales teams to customers throughout the country.
As the Azure platform evolves and new tools are developed, our state and local government customers continue to benefit from greater flexibility, functionality, and reliability in the cloud. At the same time, citizens are enjoying greater transparency and more open government at the state and local level.
The contest is still open, but the deadline for submissions is July 21, 2010, and winners will be announced in early August at ISU (Industry Solutions University), a Public Sector conference for Microsoft sales representatives. A complete description of the prizes, eligibility, and entry requirements can be found on the contest Web site. Also, follow @Microsoft_Gov on Twitter for the latest updates and news about the contest.
Day 1 at WPC was quite eventful. To help keep you all up to date on what is going on, here is a recap of the announcements Microsoft made yesterday.
The keynotes this morning at the Verizon Center focused on our award winners & partnering together in the cloud, as well as a big focus on our consumer business.
There is also a cloud tweetup today – come join us at the US Lounge from 2 to 3PM today. RSVP details below -
If you have any questions, ask them here or via Twitter. Additionally, you can find info at the following sites:
This morning, the opening keynote by Steve Ballmer, at the Microsoft WPC (Worldwide Partner Conference) was all about the cloud. I don’t think there is or has been any doubt in the last few months that Microsoft, along with many other companies, is focused on the cloud. This week, Microsoft is taking it a step further by sharing our strategy with with over 14,000 attendees from 130 countries participating in 500 sessions and over 20,000 networking meetings.
Some key comments from his keynote that I wanted to share with you are below. If you want to follow along with all of the announcements and conference info taking place this week, you can do that via www.digitalwpc.com.
The next 12 months will be an amazing time for Microsoft and our Partners. We’re all in. Join us.
Hopefully you can get a sense of the focus and excitement at this event from this blog post and the others I will be posting this week. Stay tuned. If you have any questions, ask them here or via Twitter. Additionally, you can find info at the following sites:
Like many other state and local governments, one of the major challenges in the City of Miami’s IT department is a diminishing budget and a workforce reduction that has coincided with an increase in service requests by citizens. By using the Windows Azure platform for powerful cloud computing, the city has been able to reduce technology costs, improve the services it offers citizens, and deliver those services faster than before. Now the IT department is able to develop applications much more rapidly and with less technical support needed on the infrastructure side without sacrificing performance.
In this video case study, Jim Osteen, Miami’s Assistant Director of Systems & Programming Division, and Conrad Salazar, Project Manager, discuss some of the ways the city is taking advantage of the power and scalability of Windows Azure. They also explain citizen-sourcing and how local residents use Miami 311 to identify and flag areas of concern that local officials need to address.
View the video here.
I tweeted about Frank Shaw’s (Corporate VP, Corporate Communications) blog post the other day and these numbers still amaze me – to the point that I felt I should share them with you in case you missed the post and subsequent articles.
I feel like I am constantly defending Microsoft as well, and sometimes unfairly. This post helps put things in perspective. I love this company – I have made that clear :) and we do some really great work, especially on our research side. We care about our customers – working in Public Sector reminds me of how much we care about our customers every day. I am coming up on my 5 year anniversary in this group – and I still remember the work my peers did with the Red Cross during Katrina and the aftermath. They worked non-stop for days to help put up the site so families could find each other. Amazing.
So – here are some of Frank’s favorite numbers and you can read his full blog post here:
1
150,000,000 Number of Windows 7 licenses sold, making Windows 7 by far the fastest growing operating system in history.[source]
2
7.1 million Projected iPad sales for 2010. [source]
58 million Projected netbook sales in 2010. [source]
355 million Projected PC sales in 2010. [source]
3
<10 Percentage of US netbooks running Windows in 2008. [source]
96 Percentage of US netbooks running Windows in 2009. [source]
4
0 Number of paying customers running on Windows Azure in November 2009.
10,000 Number of paying customers running on Windows Azure in June 2010. [source]
700,000 Number of students, teachers and staff using Microsoft’s cloud productivity tools in Kentucky public schools, the largest cloud deployment in the US.[source]
5
16 million Total subscribers to largest 25 US daily newspapers. [source]
14 Million Total number of Netflix subscribers. [source]
23 million Total number of Xbox Live subscribers. [source]
6
9,000,000 Number of customer downloads of the Office 2010 beta prior to launch, the largest Microsoft beta program in history. [source]
7
21.4 million Number of new Bing search users in one year. [Comscore report – requires subscription]
8
24% Linux Server market share in 2005. [source]
33% Predicted Linux Server market share for 2007 (made in 2005). [source]
21.2% Actual Linux Server market share, Q4 2009. [source]
9
8.8 million Global iPhone sales in Q1 2010. [source]
21.5 million Nokia smartphone sales in Q1 2010. [source]
55 million Total smartphone sales globally in Q1 2010. [source]
439 million Projected global smartphone sales in 2014. [source]
10
9 Number of years it took Salesforce.com to reach 1 million paid user milestone. [source]
6 Number of years it took Microsoft Dynamics CRM to reach 1 million paid user milestone. [source]
100% Percent chance that Salesforce.com CEO will mention Microsoft in a speech, panel, interview, or blog post.
11
173 million Global Gmail users. [source]
284 million Global Yahoo! Mail users.[source]
360 million Global Windows Live Hotmail users.[source]
299 million Active Windows Live Messenger Accounts worldwide. [Comscore MyMetrix, WW, March 2010 - requires subscription]
1 Rank of Windows Live Messenger globally compared to all other instant messaging services. [Comscore MyMetrix, WW, March 2010 - requires subscription]
12
$8.2 Billion Apple Net income for fiscal year ending Sep 2009. [source]
$6.5 Billion Google Net income for fiscal year ending Dec 2009. [source]
$14.5 Billion Microsoft Net Income for fiscal year ending June 2009. [source]
$23.0 billion Total Microsoft revenue, FY2000. [source]
$58.4 billion Total Microsoft revenue, FY2009. [source]
In a recent post on Bright Side, we told you about how the City of Miami and the Miami-Dade public school system are working together on some great initiatives to ensure that local students are being fully prepared for college or the workforce. An innovative and integral part of this effort is Elevate Miami and its “Rites of Passage” initiative, which has been praised as a “cradle to grave” approach to bridging Miami’s digital divide and lifting the city’s disadvantaged out of poverty.
One of the exciting aspects of Rites of Passage includes a program that provides a free home computer to each sixth-grade student who successfully completes a life-skills course centered on technology. To earn a computer, students must maintain their grades as well as regular attendance, in addition to assembling a digital portfolio and participating in a parent workshop program that ensures adult support and involvement. Just this month, the City of Miami awarded over 300 refurbished computers to Miami students under the program, bringing the total number of computers awarded since the program began in 2008 to more than 1500.
Based on the success of the program, it’s exciting to hear that the Miami-Dade public school system was recently awarded a $3.4 million ARRA (American Reinvestment & Recovery Act) grant in the sustainable broadband category. Following a model very similar to Rites of Passage, the school system will be providing 6,000 refurbished computers and 10,000 internet connections to students at 35 schools throughout Miami-Dade beginning this fall.
On a personal note, Miami’s Assistant Director of Systems & Programming Division, Jim Osteen, will close out his 27-year career with the City of Miami as he transitions into other opportunities. Jim has worked tirelessly to benefit the citizens of Miami through a number of incredible programs and initiatives aimed at expanding access to technology and providing incredible citizen services through innovation. We’ll miss Jim but know that his entrepreneurial spirit and dedication to his community will continue to play an important role in his life – I wish Jim the best in his future endeavors!
If you want to learn about how to bring the Elevate America program to your city, county or state, please visit here.
Microsoft’s World Wide Partner Conference is just around the corner. Beginning on July 11, 2010, this five-day partner event offers you a great chance to learn about Microsoft’s roadmap and best practices for the year, gain exclusive access to Microsoft executives and other partners, and to explore the infinite opportunities with Microsoft’s cloud computing strategy. I recently caught up with Vince Menzione, General Manager, US Public Sector Market Strategy, to get the inside scoop on what this year’s WPC means for our public sector partners.
What is the WorldWide Partner Conference and who should attend?
The Worldwide Partner Conference is Microsoft’s largest partner event worldwide, with over 15,000 attendees, and this year it’s being held in Washington, DC. Microsoft US Public Sector is investing significantly in this premiere event for our partners. As in past years, WPC 2010 is a key opportunity for partners to hear from the leadership of Microsoft, our product groups and the leadership of US Public Sector about our newest innovations, business priorities going into FY11 and the partnership opportunities to engage and grow with Microsoft. To date, over 600 US Public Sector partners have already registered and we’re expecting record-breaking attendance. I encourage our partners to register now for what promises to be the most valuable event for their business this year.
What opportunities does WPC provide for partners and government customers?
Partners get a real opportunity to engage with the US Public Sector leadership on a number of issues. From an educational perspective they will learn about our focus on cloud computing and how this is changing computing, our investments in infrastructure in the cloud, partner models and how partners can monetize and adopt businesses to drive cloud. Partners will also get an insider’s look at the top Pubic Sector priorities and strategies from each businesses leadership and the opportunity to meet with Microsoft sales leaders and partner account managers to discuss how their competencies align with Microsoft’s business objectives.
What’s new this year at WPC 2010?
This year’s keynote speaker will be Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, and he will discuss some exciting cloud opportunities for partners during his vision keynote. This is the first time WPC has been held in DC, so as Microsoft Public Sector we are the host and this means great programs designed for our partners. There will also be a Day of Giving on the Sunday prior to WPC where we’ll host a Wounded Warrior event at Nationals Park. We’re inviting partners to participate as we work together with the USO (United Service Organizations) and the Nationals to make care packages for US troops stationed in Afghan and Iraq. We’ll be part of a game day and reception honoring Wounded Warriors, and one of the veterans will throw out first pitch. For the first time, WPC 2010 is also offering six different passes that allow you to customize your schedule and enjoy significant savings off the price of the all access event. This is great if you want to build your own partner track or if you can’t attend all five days. For example, you can purchase a 1 day pass or 3 day pass and attend only the business and public sector sessions that are of greatest interest to you.
This year’s keynote speaker will be Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, and he will discuss some exciting cloud opportunities for partners during his vision keynote. This is the first time WPC has been held in DC, so as Microsoft Public Sector we are the host and this means great programs designed for our partners. There will also be a Day of Giving on the Sunday prior to WPC where we’ll host a Wounded Warrior event at Nationals Park. We’re inviting partners to participate as we work together with the USO (United Service Organizations) and the Nationals to make care packages for US troops stationed in Afghan and Iraq. We’ll be part of a game day and reception honoring Wounded Warriors, and one of the veterans will throw out first pitch.
For the first time, WPC 2010 is also offering six different passes that allow you to customize your schedule and enjoy significant savings off the price of the all access event. This is great if you want to build your own partner track or if you can’t attend all five days. For example, you can purchase a 1 day pass or 3 day pass and attend only the business and public sector sessions that are of greatest interest to you.
Cloud computing is, of course, a hot topic in the public sector – how are Microsoft and partners working together to make cloud services a reality for government customers?
We’re providing additional partner programs that allow partners to participate and work more closely with us on cloud services including consulting and migration, developing programs in Windows Azure, building private clouds in Microsoft software, and selling and transacting around our BPOS (Business Productivity Online Suite) offerings. We are working with all of the businesses on very customer-specific and business-specific roundtables, and cloud will be a major focus in many of these sessions.
Are there any big announcements this year that we can look forward to?
Each year we hear from a prominent guest speaker, and we just announced that our guest speaker this year will be President Bill Clinton. President Clinton will be presenting “Embracing our Common Humanity” on Wednesday, July 14. Microsoft has sponsored the Clinton Global Initiative for many years, and we’re excited to hear what President Clinton has to say about the way forward to a common future and shared values.
Thanks for taking the time to share this info Vince. It sounds like it is going to be a great event!
Guest post by Marc Schweigert, Principal Developer Evangelist, Microsoft US Public Sector
On May 25, 2010, I led a workshop at the Gov 2.0 Expo 2010 in Washington, DC. The Gov 2.0 Expo is about real-world application of Web 2.0 technologies in government and municipal sectors. In my session, “Endless Possibilities: Mapping and Presenting Open Geospatial Data,” I talked about the opportunities for government organizations to expose their data in an open fashion using the Open Data Protocol (OData) and visualizing it with Bing Maps. At Microsoft, we recognized that the direction of the Web is making data free and, more importantly, easy to use and actionable.
Helping Government organizations publish their data was the impetus behind the Open Government Data Initiative (OGDI), an effort led by the US Public Sector Developer and Platform Evangelism team at Microsoft. While sites like Data.gov contain great catalogues of government data, a majority of the data available is not programmable in the cloud and, therefore, requires a lot of processing in order to be usable. OGDI uses the Windows Azure Platform to make it easier for government agencies and developers to publish and use a wide variety of public data by implementing OData. Using common formats like KML means more interoperability across a broad range of mapping services—the bottom line is that citizens can search the open geospatial data from the source and see it displayed in their favorite mapping services in a way that makes sense.
There are several great examples of state and local governments using open geospatial data effectively. Some of those (using Bing Maps) include the New York City Transit Trip Planner, the Seattle Department of Transportation, and Miami 311, which implements the Open 311 API.
The most exciting thing for Gov 2.0 is that this is the just the beginning. With the increased popularity of location-based services (like FourSquare and Twitter) and GPS on smartphones, governments can begin to use open geospatial data to deliver information and services to citizens — with relevant information about their neighborhood delivered right to their mobile device running Bing Maps or other popular mapping services.
As I said in my presentation at Gov 2.0 Expo, when you make data programmable instead of static, the possibilities for state and local governments are endless. And when you use a format that integrates easily with popular mapping services, you help your constituents use the data in new and practical ways. For more information about how OGDI helps make this a reality,including code that can be used to publish data on the Internet in a Web-friendly format with easy-to-use, open API's—check out our free, open source starter kit here.
Guest post by Patrick Weikle, Senior Architect Evangelist, Microsoft US Public Sector
We’re really excited to announce the release of a brand new way for police departments to capture, manage, and distribute audio and video media collected during patrols. Many police agencies today either do not have in-vehicle video surveillance/digital video recording capabilities, or have only disconnected point-solutions for video capture that provide limited flexibility and storage, and require extensive training and maintenance for both IT and Officers.
Modularis and hardware partner KCI Communications have partnered to create and deliver the Mobile Video Platform (MVP), a highly flexible and connected in-vehicle video solution that delivers capabilities far beyond that of a simple DVR. MVP integrates with in-vehicle systems such as Lights, Sirens, Brakes, Radar and LIDAR, GPS, as well as Mobile CAD and Records systems. The MVP hardware runs Windows 7 Enterprise, while the MVP software is built entirely in .NET and leverages Windows Azure to provide a secure and cost-effective solution for archiving and disseminating digital video evidence and related data.
MVP takes advantage of new multi-touch features of Windows 7 making ordinarily complex operations extremely easy for officers in the field. The user experience that MVP provides is intuitive and simple to understand with very little officer training required. Additionally, using the built-in “bit-locker” feature of Windows 7 Enterprise, data is encrypted and protected from inappropriate access and distribution.
The use of Windows Azure is truly compelling for any size police Department as it presents an opportunity to conserve capital resource investment and offload data archival to a fully managed, fault tolerant, and secure environment. Uniquely, Modularis is providing as part of the MVP solution, a Microsoft Silverlight interface into the video archive. This will allow video evidence to be distributed in a secure and controlled manner.
Deputy Chief Bill Price, Vernon Hills Police Department states: “We are extremely excited about the use of Windows Azure,” said Price. “It is providing a secure, stable, and robust storage mechanism for video archival and retrieval that we would have needed to invest significant dollars to build. This feature of MVP is extremely beneficial to us in that it represents significant cost savings as well as provides a mechanism to control dissemination of digital evidence, an often overlooked concern when considering solutions of this type.”
Modularis CEO A.J. Singh states: “Aligning with Microsoft’s strategies for Azure and Windows 7 we believe our Digital Evidence Platform represents a ‘best of breed’ solution that is appropriate for the smallest municipal police department as well as the largest state or federal agency”
We’re very excited about the fantastic use of Microsoft Technology in this space. To find out more about this solution check out the case study and if you’d like a sneak preview of the MVP solution you can check out the Silverlight video at http://www.modularis.com/mvp.
While we focus primarily on the US state and local governments on Bright Side of Government, I often hear about how our international partners are taking advantage of the cloud to boost government efficiency and give citizens more choices in how they access services. Just as today’s economic climate is driving difficult decisions around IT spending and investments in the States, other countries are also seizing the opportunity to innovate and use technology to adopt new approaches to citizen services. I’d like to share a few cool examples from the recent Microsoft Worldwide Government Solutions Forum:
Public 360° – Software Innovation, a Scandinavian-based company that helps governments manage and share information and documents, recently launched its first cloud-based application on Windows Azure. Now that Public 360° is hosted in the cloud, the company flagship product suite gives citizens a better user experience while making information about ongoing cases and correspondence available through the Web. Software Innovation also plans to launch the Public 360° suite as an on-demand service on Windows Azure in early 2011. geoPort – Gecko Information Systems, a Norway-based company that provides portal, case and document management solutions to governments, recently announced new cloud-based software called geoPort. Hosted through Windows Azure, geoPort is a Web-based geoinformation system (GIS) client that enables both citizens and public servants to access public mapping services for publication, decision support and emergency response purposes. Responding to the public sector demand for more sophisticated mapping services, geoPort takes advantage of the flexibility of the cloud to provide efficient, real-time access to spatial data from both internal and public sources. Altinn II – Since its 2008 launch, Microsoft’s Citizen Services Platform (CSP) has been helping governments and partners accelerate the modernization of government and to bring services and information to citizens anytime and anywhere. And now Altinn, the Norwegian central government collaboration platform and eGovernment portal developed by Microsoft and Accenture has been updated with increased functionality, privacy, and a simplified user interface. Altinn II is making it easier for private citizens and companies to access public services through a single, centralized point of access. The Altinn II platform also includes a coordinating function that optimizes efficiency across participating organizations, reducing processing time and costs.
Public 360° – Software Innovation, a Scandinavian-based company that helps governments manage and share information and documents, recently launched its first cloud-based application on Windows Azure. Now that Public 360° is hosted in the cloud, the company flagship product suite gives citizens a better user experience while making information about ongoing cases and correspondence available through the Web. Software Innovation also plans to launch the Public 360° suite as an on-demand service on Windows Azure in early 2011.
geoPort – Gecko Information Systems, a Norway-based company that provides portal, case and document management solutions to governments, recently announced new cloud-based software called geoPort. Hosted through Windows Azure, geoPort is a Web-based geoinformation system (GIS) client that enables both citizens and public servants to access public mapping services for publication, decision support and emergency response purposes. Responding to the public sector demand for more sophisticated mapping services, geoPort takes advantage of the flexibility of the cloud to provide efficient, real-time access to spatial data from both internal and public sources.
Altinn II – Since its 2008 launch, Microsoft’s Citizen Services Platform (CSP) has been helping governments and partners accelerate the modernization of government and to bring services and information to citizens anytime and anywhere. And now Altinn, the Norwegian central government collaboration platform and eGovernment portal developed by Microsoft and Accenture has been updated with increased functionality, privacy, and a simplified user interface. Altinn II is making it easier for private citizens and companies to access public services through a single, centralized point of access. The Altinn II platform also includes a coordinating function that optimizes efficiency across participating organizations, reducing processing time and costs.
Now it’s your turn! If you have examples of creative cloud-based approaches to citizen services in your community or state, please share your story with us or feel free to leave your comments below.
The Code Project have kicked off another one of their Windows Azure Platform contests.*
Looks like a great way to promote your applications and possibly get some great PR.
Here are some examples:
It certainly is a timely contest as it seems governments are trying to encourage innovation and help developers get their ideas off the ground:
http://www.businessweek.com/smallbiz/content/may2010/sb20100526_721134.htm
*This challenge is from The Code Project, an independent third-party company not affiliated with Microsoft, and is not a Microsoft offering.
Guest post by Bill Crounse, MD, Senior Director of Worldwide Health for Microsoft
Last month, I visited Australia to keynote at a health IT conference in Sydney on how technology can be used to improve the management of chronic conditions, and we also held health executive events on chronic care management in Sydney, Brisbane, and Melbourne. Along the way, I had the pleasure of speaking about the sweeping changes that have been proposed by the Australian government, and not surprisingly, many of healthcare executives and media I spoke with wanted to know how Australia’s reforms compare to the recent health overhaul that was recently enacted here in America.
All around the developed world governments are looking for new ways to improve access to care, increase care quality, and control the escalating costs of care associated with aging populations and a higher incidence of chronic disease. When evaluating reforms in Australia and the United States specifically, I have found that the reform initiatives underway focus more on how healthcare is paid for than on transforming the ways we deliver health information and medical services.
I think this is part of the reason that Australian audiences and the press were particularly enamored by Microsoft HealthVault and some of the ways healthcare organizations such as the Mayo Clinic and Cleveland Clinic are using the platform to better care for patients with chronic diseases. One promising development in this area in Australia is Western Health’s use of Microsoft SQL Server, SharePoint, and Performance Point to create business and clinical intelligence dashboards of organization key performance indicators.
While Americans may think that other countries have already figured out healthcare reform, let me assure you it is a debate that is still “up to bat” everywhere. Still, there is much to learn from what is working (and what isn’t working) in other countries, and I found the passionate debate in Australia to be enlightening and insightful.
For more information, take a look at this short video clip from my appearance on Sky Business News and check out my recent blog entries at Microsoft’s HealthBlog
Blog re-post by Barbara Duck of The Medical Quack
A fellow Tweeter that I have been following for a while now shared a great post she did for the Microsoft Tag blog. If you don’t know what Microsoft Tag is check, check out the linked site. There are so many uses for Tag and it is extremely easy to use. Here is a portion of Barbara’s post. You can find the rest of the post here.
If you read the Medical Quack you may have seen some of my recent posts on how I think this technology would prove to be an asset to healthcare. Healthcare, like every other industry today is inundated with information and rapid communication is key. We have more mobility today with telehealth and other wireless capabilities emerging into an area that is growing by leaps and bounds, almost faster than we can keep up. We read about safety notifications and their timeliness and availability all the time, and thus my thoughts grew into the area of another avenue of using cell phones to help keep up.
Recalls of both medical devices and drugs are growing for a number of reasons. First of all, we have a lot more information available today than what we have ever had and we need to capitalize on this opportunity quickly. We read in the news every day it seems about quality control issues, devices needing software updates and so on. How do we get the word out quickly and efficiently? If one has times they can certainly search the web and put out a full on effort to find all of this every day, but healthcare workers have the same problems we all have and that is time. When human lives are involved, time is everything.
The opportunity to turn a cell phone into a “scanner” with real time information is huge. As mentioned above, this can be a daunting task at times and we have people at all different stages with using technology today and in my opinion, using a cell phone makes sense, when all one has to do is open a program on the phone and simply “shoot and aim” and relative information would be available instantly. Back in October of 2009 I kept reading about all the recalls of devices and created my first opinion/idea post here. It just made sense to me.
Tracking Medical Device Recalls – Sounds Like A Good Place for a Microsoft Tag Data Base at the FDA
Some hospitals have used RFID to work with getting recalled devices off of the hospital shelves and this is great, but what about those who have not, and furthermore, what about the consumers and/or patients. For instance I could be looking for new safety information about an over the counter drug that has been on the news, while someone else who has an implanted heart device may be looking for something else, but one thing in common is that we both need access quickly.
This is where Microsoft Tags and cell phones can play an important role. The Tags can be encrypted and will work with many RFID programs too, so to me it appears we have one big common denominator of technology that we could use to bring this all together. If medical device companies were to use a Tag on their packaging of their devices, it would only take one quick scan to ensure it has not been recalled, or alert healthcare workers that new safety information has been released on a product. Obviously if a device had been recalled, perhaps a big red screen could be used as an alert and in the case of new safety information regarding surgical procedures, when scanned, that too would show on the cell phone.
Scan that knee, hip, defibrillator before you use it, takes a few seconds and will help hospital registries function and less mistakes. Hospitals work hard to do a good job at this, but I continue to read stories to where patients have been implanted with a device that had been recalled and it was missed. One story in particular involved a man who was implanted with a heart device that had been recalled and he died when it malfunctioned. To me, this could have been a preventable incident and a life could have been saved if a simple scan would have put up the red flags to not use the device.
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There is also some work in this area relative to Personal Health Records, how convenient would it be to aim and shoot and add credible information into your Personal Health record? Would you rather sit down at a computer and go through the process or use your cell phone to add the information? If you received an EOB statement with insurance reimbursement information would this not be simple to instantly add this to your personal health record?
The link below is an article I posted a short while back that gives more details on the personal health record and device connections. You can see where the Withings scale is connected with encrypted Tags. With Tags you could also explore the idea of storing a Tag in a medical record so the patient could easily identify what device they have, implanted or external use and at any time they could play an active role in keeping up with any pertinent information they need.
Connecting HealthVault/Google Health and More to RazCode Encrypted Microsoft Tags – Automate Data Input
One day I adventured outside the area of healthcare a bit in reference to the White House story about the uninvited guests, and had these thoughts, it could be an asset to the Secret Service too, as the data base of Tags for invited guests would allow all agents to collaborate and make sure that everyone had their “Tagged” invitation in hand, so in other words no duplicates here and the Tags would update so all officers would know who checked in with real time information.
White House Security Breach – Next Time Send Out Invitations Imprinted with Microsoft Tags and Scan with 2D Bar Codes on Arrival
I see this as a technology that has some very far reaching benefits and it is available today and is not being used, especially in areas where lives can be saved and errors can be reduced. Granted each use would have its own element of design and planning and infrastructure implementation would need to take place, but the basic functionality of what can be accomplished in my thoughts here truly substantiates a “proof of concept” that shouldn’t be over looked as we are losing out with not using a simple and efficient technology that could benefit so many and save lives.
Tags could be stored in “cloud” data bases, like SQL server as one example and processes written around to develop alerts and notifications for when information changes, we do this already with electronic medical records so the idea is not new and novel, just needs some innovation and programming.
This post here is somewhat of my request for a “wake up” call for many to explore and see if we can better utilize technologies that are here today and will grow with tomorrow to help us navigate though the era of information overload and explore the use of “smart technologies”. That is somewhat why I started my blogging campaign at the Medical Quack to hopefully create an awareness and maybe spur some creating thinking here with pharmaceutical companies, medical device companies and the FDA as an available technology that could stand to save lives, improve how we communicate and evaluate information and besides all of that when you try out some tags, it does have an element of fun and excitement too when you watch all of this take place on your phone!
Would I as a consumer like the availability of being able to use my phone to get this information instantly? You bet I would and I can guess too that clinicians would also welcome using this technology as they could have instant information instead of a lot of extra time in going to the web and performing time consuming research. We simply are running short of time to do all of this today and I think we should give this some heavy consideration here with improving how and where we find the information we need.
Remember to read the full post, as I pulled out portions. There are other great examples and info that Barbara shares. You can find the rest of the post here.