As cloud computing continues to grow, today’s cloud ecosystem includes a variety of models designed to benefit organisations’ unique requirements around infrastructure, workloads, security, and more. In this blog, we’ll look at the drivers behind the acceleration towards cloud and multi-cloud infrastructure, while flagging the nature of much of the work still to be done.
Cloud has a lot to answer for. It’s common for people to refer to the internet itself as the cloud. However, we’ll take it to mean storage, compute and connectivity separate and remote from a company’s in-house infrastructure.
Given that definition, we’re already seeing huge cloud adoption and statistics from hostingtribunal.com show the global public cloud computing market is set to reach $623 billion by 2023, while cloud data centres will process 94% of all workloads in 2021.
Having a multi-cloud infrastructure allows organisations to distribute their workload across multiple cloud environment allowing them to be more effective as well as reducing the risks associated with individual cloud environments. For this reason, there is a predicted growth and adoption for multi-cloud infrastructure.
Pareto still rules the IT roost
A McKinsey report from late-2019, Unlocking business acceleration in a hybrid cloud world, says that despite migrating a portion of workloads to the cloud, around 80% of CIOs haven’t attained the business benefits they originally sought. Companies are falling short of IT agility expectations, regardless of cloud migration. Even organisations that have transitioned most workloads to the cloud stay in the same range of IT agility as their slower-moving cousins.
The fact is that, despite the growth in cloud adoption, compute and storage is still a Pareto world. 80% of an IT team’s work is keeping the lights on, while only the other 20% is spent on strategic functions. Legacy data centres still soak up huge effort, while ill-judged cloud usage may save capital cost but might add to IT teams’ operational burdens.
An oasis in a coronavirus world
Turning to the current coronavirus pandemic, once over the immediate impact sectors bearing the brunt of the ill effects like retail, manufacturing and hospitality will be forced to reorient their business models. Telehouse is not only able to offer an oasis where automation has made us less susceptible to reactive phenomena like lockdowns, but also to help organisations plug (or even eliminate the need for) short- and long-term skill gaps. Share your immediate problems with us now, while looking towards how your business continuity might be strengthened to deflect future such exogenous shocks.
Using intelligent cloud tools
The true art of the cloud is not in wholesale cloud deployments. Rather it is in intelligently using the cloud tools at our disposal. For example, edge computing and cloud connectivity are of growing importance to the realisation of new IoT-driven techniques like robots and autonomous vehicles. Placing traffic and processing closer to the consumer to reduce latency and enable greater control.
A major strength Telehouse brings to the party is interconnection between end-users and service providers like OTT broadcast, retail, gaming and gambling, and cloud and streaming companies. So, when organisations start to view the cloud as a driver of digital transformation, intelligent cloud adoption can simplify corporate IT architectures and processes.
Integration and connectivity hold the key
The Top 7 digital transformation trends shaping 2020 report from MuleSoft recorded that the average international firm runs no less than 900 separate applications, of which only 29% connect or integrate with each other. Achieving integration largely depends on the existence of APIs (the alternative is the huge costs of custom integration projects). Connectivity requirements, on the other hand, depend upon the mix between public, private and hosted cloud domains and the access arrangements that mix implies.
Evolving and globalising IT infrastructures for digital transformation to maintain competitive advantage is the key driver for most leading organisations. They need a solutions provider that can offer a flexible on demand service that reacts and scales to demands placed on the business, giving access to secure, flexible and highly connected digital assets.
That way strong partnerships are built across peering ecosystems, enhancing service delivery with workflows that will scale at cost while embracing disruptive technologies. That way also lies reliability and industry-leading service availability. So, what steps should one take? The following is a simple-sounding process that can be successfully used to reduce cloud complexity.
With more than 90% of major organisations already in the cloud, the first thing is to audit one’s multi-cloud environment and make cloud sourcing decisions.
In parallel, audit current applications and identify those needing performance remediation. Spot data siloes and ways to integrate them.
Mandate cloud-first strategies for new app designs (and take care not to create new data siloes).
Conduct an IT skills audit to make the business case complete, before seeking board authorisation for the revised cloud adoption strategy.
Cloud adoption and multi-cloud infrastructure creates new challenges for security and networking teams to address issues relating to multi-cloud operations and security, while ensuring that costs are reduced, and productivity levels are maintained.
It is essential that multi-cloud adoption be strategically planned as it is more complex to navigate than other environments. The key areas of multi-cloud adoption include speed, security, scalability, and sustainability. It provides users with resiliency and migration opportunities.
Telehouse ticks all the boxes
Providing access to a highly connected digital ecosystem of service providers, Telehouse guarantees a highly secure IT operating environment. It also offers the ability to access seamless and secure low-latency and direct connections to multiple cloud infrastructure and hybrid cloud services such as Amazon Web Services Direct Connect and Microsoft Azure ExpressRoute to ensure perfect integration. There are significant latency advantages too. Well positioned to help organisations access leading cloud services, with over 30 years of experience in providing end-to-end global solutions for which London was and still is the crucible, Telehouse offers guaranteed performance globally.
Telehouse ticks all the boxes
Providing access to a highly connected digital ecosystem of service providers, Telehouse guarantees a highly secure IT operating environment. It also offers the ability to access seamless and secure low-latency and direct connections to multiple cloud and hybrid cloud services such as Amazon Web Services Direct Connect and Microsoft Azure ExpressRoute to ensure perfect integration. There are significant latency advantages too. Well positioned to help organisations access leading cloud services, with over 30 years of experience in providing end-to-end global solutions for which London was and still is the crucible, Telehouse offers guaranteed performance globally.
Contact a Telehouse expert
At Telehouse we can help. We own the space where internet service providers congregate to interconnect and where enterprises come to find elegance in their storage and compute strategies. And it’s where we can bring the finest minds to bear on helping you solve the cloud adoption and multi-cloud infrastructure conundrums covered in this blog.
Contact Us
Telehouse International Corporation of Europe, Coriander Avenue, London, E14 2AA
T: +44 (0) 20 7512 0550
E: [email protected]
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