CIO - Google Inc. recently signed up another big customer for its Google Apps Premier collaboration and productivity suite: Jaguar Land Rover. The vehicle maker obtained a license for 15,000 employees worldwide, adding another name brand to Google's roster of big commercial customers, such as business services firm Rentokil Initial PLC and vehicle parts maker Valeo.
Jaguar Land Rover is in the process of separating its systems from those of former parent Ford Motor Co., which sold the luxury brands to Tata Motors Ltd. last year for $2.3 billion.
Jeremy Vincent, CIO at Jaguar Land Rover, said he's a recent convert to Web-based applications. "Six or seven months ago, I didn't know what cloud computing was, but I was invited to speak at a conference on it, so I thought I had better learn. I did, and it fundamentally changed my attitude towards IT," he said.
The low cost of Google Apps "enabled me to get the approval process signed off quickly," Vincent said, "but in the future, it will give us access to a commodity solution across the workforce."
He said he was recruited to Jaguar Land Rover "on a change agenda," and going with Google Apps fit the bill. "If you do the same as everyone else, don't expect to be better than anybody else," he added.
—Martin Veitch, CIO U.K.
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