Every cloud has a silver lining

Virtualisation and cloud go hand in hand – and as virtualisation and cloud technologies finally come of age, organisations are moving quickly to get on board.

The recession forced a lot of IT decisions to be put on hold, but renewed business growth is now enabling organisations to review their current infrastructure and upgrade their tech.

Virtualisation is usually a prerequisite for a cloud transition – shifting workloads to virtual servers vastly simplifies the process of transferring those servers to a virtual hosting infrastructure. Now software, processing power, infrastructure, IT, and more, are available as on-demand services, as businesses recognise the many advantages of cloud.

And we’re set to see even more move to the cloud. Analyst firm IDC says while the first phase of cloud has been focused on improving efficiency and cutting costs, “chapter two” of cloud adoption will be more user and solution-driven.

What we’ll also see is a lot more resource-intensive applications moving cloudwards. For example, a CGI graphics company, or film studio, (think the likes of Pixar) needs a lot of processing power, and currently will build its own (expensive) applications. In the very near future we’ll see this type of resource intensive business making the choice to ‘rent’ from the cloud instead of investing huge amounts of money and resource into developing their own apps.

But back to the present day. Regardless of whether a business is planning a full cloud deployment, it still makes sense to move to virtualisation. Cost savings, simplified deployment, increased speed and agility, improved back-up and disaster recovery are high on the list of motivations to move to a virtualised environment. It also frees up IT staff, allowing them to be proactive –they can focus their attention on innovating for competitive advantage instead of just maintenance and provisioning.

For businesses moving to the cloud, however, the question is where should they store their information and run their applications – should they go public, stay private or look at a combination of the two?

The rush to cloud – and the hybrid hype
As soon as businesses recognised the advantages of moving from CAPEX to OPEX virtualisation models, we saw a rush to public cloud.
The public cloud model is ideal for many businesses, particularly SMEs, thanks to the limited upfront investment required and the high degree of flexibility it provides. With little downtime for deployment and a swift implementation process, transitioning is simple. It allows maximum agility and scalability, and its cost benefits are proven. Businesses can also take advantage of the economies of scale that private cloud offers.

However, there has been a noticeable perception shift of late, brought on by PRISM fears and recent high profile cloud outages, such as Amazon – one of the biggest players in cloud-based services. Customers have been rightly concerned about how these events may affect the security of their data. Many businesses will have no idea where their data is being stored and how different countries’ privacy and data laws may affect them.

Private cloud offers increased security for businesses for whom data is extra-precious and for whom functionality is mission-critical. However, it can be cost-intensive to set up, which can be a barrier to many businesses.

Hybrid cloud offers the best of both worlds. Organisations can choose to keep some IT functions or non-sensitive operations in a public cloud, where scalability and cost efficiencies are greatest, relying on the security of a private cloud for higher-risk or bespoke functions.

There are many ways that a hybrid cloud model can be implemented. Businesses that manage their own private clouds can choose to integrate a public cloud service into their infrastructure, separate cloud providers can team up to offer integrated private and public services, or an individual cloud provider can offer a complete hybrid package.

Moving to virtualisation and the cloud
For businesses considering a move, the first step is to reassess their strategic IT relationships to ensure their partners have the capabilities needed. If, for example, they are moving to a hybrid environment, it’s vital to ensure their provider has expertise in both private and public cloud.

No migration to virtualisation or cloud is the same – each business has very different needs, so beware of cookie-cutter solutions. A good provider should take the time to fully understand your business needs and recommend a bespoke solution.

Resilience is also key. A good virtualisation or cloud solution must ensure continuous availability of IT systems and data integrity, and be able to mitigate the effects of a disaster quickly and cost-effectively. Infrastructure also needs to be able to quickly and automatically scaled up or down.
SLAs and downtime provisions are also important. Businesses should ascertain if their provider has penalties for downtime built into their SLA, and get insight into workarounds for downtime to ensure the business can continue to function.

It’s vital to prioritise connectivity too – and it’s not just about bandwidth. Decent bandwidth is essential for performance, of course, but as more companies employ XaaS models – such as voice-as-a-service and unified-communications-as-a-service – a highly connected communications infrastructure adds real value and becomes key to business success.

As mentioned earlier in this article, knowing where data is stored is an increasingly important question for businesses to ask their providers.
This is a matter of legality for some businesses – such as financial institutions – where data must be hosted in the UK or be subject to certain restrictions if it is stored elsewhere. Data in the cloud can often be stored on an international server – meaning these companies could inadvertently be contravening regulations.

But as the PRISM stories have shown, all businesses should ensure they’re aware of their data’s location. Privacy and data legislation varies across Europe, as do anti-terrorism laws, which means governments may be able to access business data. It’s important that providers can give details of where data is located and what this means for security.

In a nutshell
In 2013, a virtualised business is a smart business. When it comes to cloud, there’s a solution to suit every business, and bespoke hybrid cloud packages are an increasingly popular option. But as with all IT decisions, the devil is in the detail – businesses shouldn’t be afraid to quiz their providers at every step of the way. Knowledge is power and the results will be worth it.