Economists have a consensus that Small to Medium Sized Businesses (SMBs) are the backbone of any economy. They are an engine for strong growth and jobs creation. However, SMBs have to overcome a lot of challenges as well.
One of the major challenge that most SMBs have to confront is much bigger and well established competitors. To carve their own space in the market, SMBs have to outperform their bigger counterparts.
Cost reduction and operational efficiency are the major factors that help SMBs thrive in a super competitive space. To attain optimal efficiency, SMBs have to leverage technology in many different ways.
The Solution – A Hybrid Cloud
A hybrid cloud environment is the most optimal technology choice for SMBs on many counts. In a hybrid environment, SMBs are able to distribute workloads between on premise hardware, private cloud and the public cloud.
For a clearer understanding, lets club together the on premise hardware and the private cloud. For all intents and purposes, they are almost the same. Though costly to setup and maintain, this type of hardware choice allows maximum level of control to SMBs.
However, the costs at times can rise very sharply, affecting the business bottom-line. So, the solution is a hybrid IT infrastructure that also includes a Public Cloud Service Provider (CSP) like dinCloud.
The public cloud relieves SMBs from investing too heavily in on premise data centers or the private cloud. At the same time, the public cloud is instantly scalable whenever an SMB desires a quick re-factoring of resources to meet heightened demand.
Features of the Hybrid Cloud
While each SMB would choose its own mix of hybrid cloud, depending on its unique needs, here are a few common characteristics of the hybrid cloud.
- An on-premise or dedicated private data center that is independent of the public cloud infrastructure.
- The ability of both the private and public cloud to safely communicate via fully end to end encrypted channels.
- The SMB’s ability to have full visibility and management of the workloads, whether they are running in the public or private cloud environment.
Automation and Data Mobility
To attain the true benefits for any hybrid cloud deployment, SMBs direly need to automate certain processes, especially the mobility of data to and fro in a seamless manner. The apparent costs incurred at this stage will prove of great value down the road.
In any hybrid cloud environment, data and workloads will oscillate between the private and public cloud infrastructures. So, this entire process must be seamless and secure at the same time, in order to deliver the optimal results.
Considerations for the Hybrid Cloud
Below are a few core issues that an SMB must keep at the forefront when choosing a hybrid cloud and the public cloud service provider (CSP).
- When data will move beyond organizational boundaries, you need to be crystal clear about meeting all the compliance regulations in vogue.
- Ideally, your applications should be able to run in both the environments. This needs thorough testing of apps, especially under high stress conditions.
- When choosing the public cloud provider, you must resolve compatibility related bottlenecks to prevent downtimes.
- You need to keep tabs on the costs, and the best way to meet stringent migration budgets is proper planning with realistic timelines.
- With data constantly moving to and fro, security of the overall environment will become paramount. There should be stringent security protocols in place.
The Role of Public Cloud Provider
An SMB needs to be particularly mindful of the public cloud provider’s role in the whole process. The CSP should have the capability, infrastructure and understanding of what the SMB wants to attain by deploying a hybrid cloud environment.
Conclusion
Hybrid cloud is the sweet spot between full on premise IT hardware and the public cloud. It allows SMBs the freedom and control of on-premise, while the cost and scalability benefits of the public cloud.
Contact dinCloud for highly customizable and cost efficient cloud solutions that can take the efficiency as well as competitiveness of your SMB to a whole new level.
