IBM Cloud Wins a 2019 Stratus Cloud Award for Cloud Computing
The IBM Cloud Platform Unification Project is awarded for achievements in Cloud Computing
Our team at IBM Cloud is excited to announce that we’ve recently been awarded a 2019 Stratus Award for Cloud Computing for the IBM Cloud Platform Unification Project in the Hybrid Cloud Provider category. We are thrilled for our team to be recognized in these awards, for our diligent efforts in making our cloud products more consumable to our users.
“The 33 winners we recognize today are changing the way we all communicate, conduct business and interact with the world. We are honored and proud to reward these leaders in business.” — Maria Jimenez, Chief Nominations Officer of Business Intelligence Group
What is the IBM Cloud Platform Unification Project?
The IBM Cloud Platform Unification Project (PUP) was an effort across a cross functional team of designers, developers, and product offering managers to unify all of IBM’s cloud offerings into one platform, with a cohesive and easy-to-use user experience. IBM Cloud users enjoyed the hundreds of products and services that they had access to, however they reported that it was difficult having to access them through different portals. IBM PUP created a central platform for users that made their applications more accessible and easier to navigate, and allowed users to search for and find all the different cloud offerings under one URL.
The platform interface offers a sleek UI that engages users and helps them accomplish tasks faster. The IBM Cloud UI was also updated to include bold graphics and data visualizations, as well as an accessible voice and tone of the UI content, down to even the server error pages. These product updates were also designed with a cohesive global application of design language and principles, so that the user experience extended from the IBM Cloud platform landing page to the actual products themselves, helping to give users a sense of familiarity while they were using the platform.
Designing a Platform
The target users of this project were IBM Cloud clients who were constantly navigating between different applications and needed an easier way to view and find all of their products. The IBM Cloud products were all designed to be user-centered and intuitive, however users had to adjust to a new environment as they worked within each product. Users also needed to access customer and technical support, manage their billing, and discover new products in an easier way. The design team behind the IBM Cloud Platform Unification Project wanted to give users a seamless and focused path to accomplish all of these things.
Following the principles of IBM Enterprise Design Thinking framework (Observe > Reflect > Make), the team created a platform that offered a more cohesive user experience across the IBM Cloud portfolio. Users could go to one location where they could find everything related to IBM Cloud products, from discovering new applications to troubleshooting their software. The team also emphasized on visual as well as content design focus, to give IBM Cloud a stronger brand and a user community. To ensure that the new designs met users needs and assisted in the task completion of their jobs to be done, the design team spent a lot of time and effort in performing user research to be able to optimize the user flows and journey. The resulting impact is a completely new way for users to experience IBM Cloud. They can now easily manage their IT systems, access customer and technical support, manage their billing, find and order new products and more — all from a single holistic experience.
About the Business Intelligence Group Awards
The Business Intelligence Group launched its crowd-sourced industry awards programs to recognize authentic talent in the business world. The organization’s scoring system selectively measures performance across multiple business domains and rewards companies with outstanding achievements throughout various areas of businesses and technology.
Congrats to the IBM Cloud Platform team for all their hard work in making this a great product for our users.
Arin Bhowmick (@arinbhowmick) is Vice President, Design at IBM based in San Francisco, California. The above article is personal and does not necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.
