Google just got a huge userbase with the city of Los Angeles equipping its employees with Google Apps which they can use for email  and collaboration in the cloud.  Starting today, more than 34,000 city employees will have access to various Google tools and services provided by Google Apps’ suite of collaborative technologies.

The decision to adapt Google Apps was made by the city’s CTO Randi Levin and her team at the city’s Information Technology Agency. The group evaluated 14 proposals but found Google Apps to be the most practical and most suited for the employees needs.

True enough, Google Apps cloud computing service may actually improve the city’s email system secutiry and reliability – something all govenment agencies should pay close attention to.

Employees will also have access to collaboration technology including facility to share docs, sites and videos which employees can edit simulataneously in the cloud.  The City is hoping that the use of Google Apps will help the employees run the City smoothly and efficiently.

But the bottomline of course is the fact that aside from  implementing a robust information technology strategy, it actually lessens the cost the City will be spending on its IT infrastructure. And consistent uptime is almost assured being hosted in Google’s cloud.

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