All change at G-Cloud, as project director steps down

A businessman's hand placing white squares with black lettering spelling out "Goodbye!" on a yellow background

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Denise McDonagh, programme director for the government’s G-Cloud, has stepped aside after 13 months in the role.

In a blog post announcing her departure, McDonagh said: “What we’ve done is truly groundbreaking. G-Cloud is generating interest from around the world, with many now following our lead.

“I believe that it is one of the most disruptive changes for good that I’ve seen in my entire career in government IT, and I believe this will forever change the way we commission and use IT in the public sector.”

McDonagh’s resignation coincides with the G-Cloud transitioning from being a stand-alone programme to becoming part of the Government Digital Service (GDS).

“I’m confident that GDS will continue to improve G-Cloud, building on our success and providing strong leadership and support for departments as they move towards ever wider adoption of Cloud solutions,” said McDonagh.

Mark Craddock, who headed up the CloudStore until 1 June, claims the move to GDS is a positive one and will help G-Cloud be more successful, as well as making the cloud first agenda easier.

“The move to GDS fits in nicely with what they are doing with the digital agenda. We had also been struggling for a while to get some decent funding from the Cabinet Office, and GDS has stepped up and said they will fund the G-Cloud Programme,” Craddock told Cloud Pro.

“Some people have decided not to carry on with G-Cloud, but they may well pop up later on in other government departments to help them with their cloud strategy,” he said.

Craddock added that even before the cloud first push, the pipeline of work he and his team were dealing with was so great they were struggling to cope, but that he expects the move to GDS to mitigate this.

But despite McDonagh and Craddock’s hopes, and despite the Government adopting an official cloud first strategy, minister for the Cabinet Office Francis Maude recently admitted the service was currently underused.

However, Craddock contested it is not easy to change government purchasing practices, and that time and the cloud first push will help overcome this.

Tony Singleton, COO at GDS, now takes over as the head of the G-Cloud project.

Jane McCallion is ITPro's deputy editor, specializing in cloud computing, cyber security, data centers and enterprise IT infrastructure. Before becoming Deputy Editor, she held the role of Features Editor, managing a pool of freelance and internal writers, while continuing to specialise in enterprise IT infrastructure, and business strategy.

Prior to joining ITPro, Jane was a freelance business journalist writing as both Jane McCallion and Jane Bordenave for titles such as European CEO, World Finance, and Business Excellence Magazine.