IBM released a report of how the Windsor-Essex, Ontario, Canada region’s use of its offerings to help its 393,000 citizens community by creating jobs, building homes for the homeless, and even treating asthma. IBM Software Services for Lotus, WebSphere Portal, lBM Lotus Web Content Management software, and IBM Lotus Quickr are some of the offerings utilized to restructure public processes.

“The Windsor-Essex Smart Community Web infrastructure provides the region’s government and related organizations with the tools to help citizens with emergency and community services, transportation, health, utilities and life events such as getting married, having a baby or retiring.”

The most notable use of the Windsor-Essex web portal was probably by the Asthma Research Group. The organization’s program helps asthmatics find respiratory therapists in a matter of weeks instead of the typical six months, and reduced sick days at a local automobile manufacturing by 55%.

The cloud contributed to the community ways too. The technology helped to create a regional program which created 30 jobs, and led to the reuse of 250 tons of construction waste for new charitable housing projects. The Smart Community Portal also enables local businesses to interactively attract tourists.

The Windsor-Essex IBM collaboration is a very good example of the cloud being used in the real world. Windsor-Essex was announced as one of the Top seven Most Intelligent Communities in the world by the ICF, demonstrating just how effective cloud service can be in just about every context.

We’ve seen IBM using social media and cloud-networking in New York, they are continuing to embrace the cloud, and making other humanitarian (or at least environmental efforts) in greening the Bank of China in the UK. These projects have been giving IBM a lot of the limelight and in fact allow them a chance to fasten themselves more tightly to world governments and trends that will permit sustainability by decentralizing efforts through using cloud-computing, -storage, and -networking to make numerous innovative strides in each of these industries.