Last month, IBM and Peruvian fund for financing state business Fonafe announced a five-year service agreement worth US$9.7mn to bring cloud computing to government services in the country. Local clients benefiting from the center include firms in vertical markets such as pharmaceuticals, retail and mining, but IBM is also leveraging its Peru facilities to serve clients in Ecuador and Chile, according to Sarmiento and IBM's general manager for Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, Uruguay and Paraguay, Jaime García. Future steps aimed at fanning cloud computing business in Peru include continued IT security expenditures, as well as human resources investments that will provide the basis for further evangelization activities. Additional cloud drivers include economic growth, cost reduction and high availability. Globally, IBM saw its net income for 2010 grow 10% last year, reaching US$14.8bn, while revenues during the same period increased 4% to US$99.9bn.