diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index ccee721fb1e2f..2328e252e3225 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -71,11 +71,13 @@ For more options see file: `CONTRIBUTING.md`
   Building the `ci/cloud` project requires a [github API token](https://blog.github.com/2013-05-16-personal-api-tokens/).
   The API key will need repo access (repo checkbox).
 
-  Once a github API token has been acquired two environment variables must be set: `GH_OWNER` and `GH_TOKEN`.
+  Once a github API token has been acquired three environment variables must be set: `GH_OWNER`, `GH_TOKEN`, and `SDK_VERSION`.
 
   `GH_OWNER` should be set to `elastic` but can be overridden to your fork if necessary.
 
-  `GH_OWNER=elastic GH_TOKEN=mytoken ./gradlew build`
+  `chmod +x getJavaSdk.sh`
+
+  `GH_OWNER=elastic GH_TOKEN=mytoken SDK_VERSION=1.2.0-SNAPSHOT ./getJavaSdk.sh`
 
 ## Contributing
 
diff --git a/ci/cloud/build.gradle b/ci/cloud/build.gradle
index aac308e78ff67..ecd1a8fa3f4d6 100755
--- a/ci/cloud/build.gradle
+++ b/ci/cloud/build.gradle
@@ -6,8 +6,6 @@
  */
 
 import com.sun.org.apache.xalan.internal.xslt.Process
-import groovy.json.JsonSlurper
-import groovy.json.JsonException
 import org.estf.gradle.SetupCloudCluster
 import org.estf.gradle.DeleteCloudCluster
 import org.estf.gradle.ShellCommand
@@ -19,82 +17,17 @@ plugins {
 
 group 'org.estf.cloud'
 version '1.0'
-project.ext.sdkVersion = '1.2.0-SNAPSHOT'
 
 apply plugin: 'groovy'
 
 repositories {
     mavenCentral()
-    flatDir {
-        dirs 'libs'
-    }
-}
-
-/**
- * This task download the cloud-java-sdk to libs/
- * Github makes it difficult to download artifacts from the releases page.
- * First, we must locate the asset for the release by tag.
- * Next, we must find the asset's URL in the response, and make a request to download it following redirects.
- *
- * THIS IS TEMPORARY UNTIL WE HAVE A PRIVATE COMMON MAVEN FOR ALL TEAMS TO SHARE
- */
- /*
-task getJavaSdk {
-    def libsFolder = new File('libs')
-    if (!libsFolder.exists()) {
-        libsFolder.mkdirs()
-    }
-    def ghOwner = System.env['GH_OWNER']
-    def ghToken = System.env['GH_TOKEN']
-    if (ghOwner == null || ghToken == null) {
-        throw new GradleException('GH_OWNER and GH_TOKEN must be set.')
-    }
-
-    def getReleaseByTagTemplate = 'https://api.github.com/repos/%s/cloud-sdk-java/releases/tags/v%s?access_token=%s'
-    def getReleaseByTagUrl = String.format(getReleaseByTagTemplate, ghOwner, project.sdkVersion, ghToken)
-    def getReleaseByTagCommand = ['curl', getReleaseByTagUrl]
-    def getReleaseByTagResponse = getReleaseByTagCommand.execute()
-    handleCurlExitCode(getReleaseByTagResponse, getReleaseByTagCommand)
-    def json = new JsonSlurper().parseText(getReleaseByTagResponse.text)
-    handleErrorMessage(json, getReleaseByTagUrl)
-
-    def assetUrl = json.assets[0].url + "?access_token=${ghToken}"
-    def filename = "libs/${json.assets[0].name}"
-    def getAssetCommand =
-            ['curl', '-L', '-H', 'Accept: application/octet-stream', assetUrl, '-o', filename]
-    def getAssetResponse = getAssetCommand.execute()
-    handleCurlExitCode(getAssetResponse, getAssetCommand)
-    // If the download fails, the error message will be written as the contents of the .jar.
-    // If the .jar is a parseable json body we can assume something went wrong with the download.
-    try {
-        json = new JsonSlurper().parseText(new File(filename).text)
-        handleErrorMessage(json, assetUrl)
-    } catch (JsonException jsonException) {
-        // NOP
-    }
-}
-
-def handleErrorMessage(json, url) {
-    if (json.message) {
-        throw new GradleException("An error message was returned when attempting to find the release by tag\n" +
-                "URL: ${url}\n" +
-                "ERROR: ${json.message}")
-    }
-}
-
-def handleCurlExitCode(response, command) {
-    if (response.waitFor() != 0) {
-        throw new GradleException("The following command exited with nonzero status\n" +
-                "Command: ${command}")
-    }
 }
 
 dependencies {
-    compile group: 'co.elastic.cloud', name: 'sdk-java', version: project.sdkVersion
     compile 'org.codehaus.groovy:groovy-all:2.3.11'
     testCompile group: 'junit', name: 'junit', version: '4.12'
 }
-*/
 
 /*
  General Methods
diff --git a/ci/cloud/buildSrc/build.gradle b/ci/cloud/buildSrc/build.gradle
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000000..d1ebef3a81638
--- /dev/null
+++ b/ci/cloud/buildSrc/build.gradle
@@ -0,0 +1,9 @@
+repositories {
+    flatDir {
+        dirs 'libs'
+    }
+}
+
+dependencies {
+    compile group: 'co.elastic.cloud', name: 'sdk-java', version: "1.2.0-SNAPSHOT"
+}
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/ci/cloud/getJavaSdk.sh b/ci/cloud/getJavaSdk.sh
new file mode 100755
index 0000000000000..48d035434861c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/ci/cloud/getJavaSdk.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,21 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+export PYTHONIOENCODING=utf8
+
+libsDir="buildSrc/libs"
+ghOwner="${GH_OWNER:?GH_OWNER needs to be set!}"
+ghToken="${GH_TOKEN:?GH_TOKEN needs to be set!}"
+sdkVersion="${SDK_VERSION:?SDK_VERSION needs to be set!}"
+
+getReleaseByTagUrl="https://api.github.com/repos/${ghOwner}/cloud-sdk-java/releases/tags/v${sdkVersion}?access_token=${ghToken}"
+
+if [ ! -d ${libsDir} ]; then
+	echo "Creating libs directory..."
+	mkdir ${libsDir}
+	echo "Created!"
+fi
+
+getReleaseByTagResponse=$(curl -s ${getReleaseByTagUrl})
+assetName=$(curl -s ${getReleaseByTagUrl} | python -c "import sys, json;print json.load(sys.stdin)['assets'][0]['name']")
+assetUrl=$(curl -s ${getReleaseByTagUrl} | python -c "import sys, json; print json.load(sys.stdin)['assets'][0]['url']")
+assetUrlWithAuth="${assetUrl}?access_token=${ghToken}"
+downloadResponse=$(curl -L -H "Accept: application/octet-stream" ${assetUrlWithAuth} -o ${libsDir}/${assetName})
\ No newline at end of file