Some of the nation's biggest technology firms, including Microsoft, IBM, Cisco and Hewlett-Packard, are teaming up to encourage large companies to use cloud computing services. The new Enterprise Cloud Buyers Council wants to create a set of uniform standards and metrics for the emerging field of cloud computing so that companies can more easily compare services and jump from vendor to vendor.

Absent from the list, however, is Amazon.com, an early leader in the cloud computing field. Amazon has been ramping up its own pitch to enterprise customers lately with a series of new offerings.

Other members of the Enterprise Cloud Buyers Council include EMC, Alcatel-Lucent, Nokia Siemens Networks, and AT&T. The group says its mission is, among other things, to "accelerate standardization and commoditzation of cloud services" and "achieve transparency of cost, services levels and reporting across the ecosystem."

Amazon couldn't immediately be reached for comment. The company has been making push of its own to attract big companies and government agencies (and their big IT budgets) to its cloud services. While the concept of cloud computing — buying and accessing computing services via the internet — has gained in prominence, many large institutions remain skittish about its security and reliability and have hesitated to put sensitive data in the cloud.

Amazon this week introduced a new set of larger storage options for its S3 cloud service targeted at big customers. The company has also been cutting prices on its core cloud services over the last couple months, just as Microsoft rolls out its Azure cloud computing platform.

[Via PC World]

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