With businesses generating more data than ever, the cloud is always a good fall back for storage and agility. Reducing operational costs and improving analytical power, there is little doubt that cloud computing is the way to go to optimize organizational business intelligence.
As we’ve learned through the years however, just saying that you want the cloud isn’t enough. The question arises with what platform to select, be it private, public, or hybrid cloud – the best of both worlds. Each is designed for specific targets depending on the type of data being used, and the level of security and management required. Depending on particular business needs and intricacy, different platforms are suited and different questions should be asked.
The difference between the three is fairly simple:
- Private Cloud is constructed and housed on a private network or data center with information protected behind a firewall. Since the organization owns the cloud, they are responsible for the cost, time and resources associated with management, maintenance and updating of servers, potentially offset by the enhanced level of security this type of infrastructure can offer. Often times, this is known as legacy infrastructure since agility is still limited and migration is fairly easy since data is going from on-site platform to another.
- Public Cloud on the other hand, offer processing, analytical and data storage power, without the necessity of management. The data is stored in data centers supported by the provider. The advantage of this type of system is the marked reduction in lead times for product deployment, which helps if you are aiming to be compliant with healthcare or financial regulations. Moreover, resources can be allocated to areas that add business value as opposed to platform development and maintenance. This moves the costs from an initial capital expenditure to operational expenses while providing greater scalability and nearly limitless technical potential.
- Hybrid Cloud is a mix of both private and public cloud infrastructure. In this instance, there are more elements of your IT strategy that you need to keep track of, but also greater innovative potential.
In choosing the right platform, it is imperative to take the business needs into consideration. The size of the business and its budget is a genuine concern, and thus CIOs and business leaders need to regard these factors when making decisions. By looking at the big picture and making an intelligent decision, organizations can understand their limitations and capabilities.
Often the decision to choose a particular IT infrastructure is a financial one. It boils down to the question of whether the organization would benefit from a higher initial outlay and lower running costs or customizable, modular monthly installments following very minor initiation costs. As with any implementation, it is important to understand the business strategy and align the solution with the cloud ecosystem that supports it. We always recommend careful due diligence before moving forward.
Get Started with Cloud
Are you still on the fence about cloud? Worried you might never get there? We can help – reach out to one of our specialists at sales@perficient.com for a conversation and download our DevOps guide to learn how you can use the cloud to drive innovation.
