Is Cloud Migration the Best Solution for Businesses?

As businesses are becoming increasingly aware of the multiple benefits cloud computing can have in terms of efficiency and profitability, more and more businesses are moving to the cloud. Multiple surveys globally have repeatedly confirmed that the cloud-solutions work better than the on-premise solutions, and so, the use of cloud technology, which is already on the rise, must be adopted by more and more businesses.

Besides the most obvious reasons (such as, flexibility, efficiency and earning strategic value that contribute in scaling one’s business in the cloud), there are many other not-so-obvious, but concrete benefits that have immense potential to make the businesses more dynamic. These would help with easing the management issues and lower the costs of computing and operations

Cloud migration may entail migrating a total organizational infrastructure, (including computing, storage, software and platform services) to the cloud for access.

Which model should one opt for?

Enterprise users cannot merely get applications to market quickly, without worrying about underlying infrastructure costs or maintenance. They must deploy the best possible process of moving data, applications or other business elements to achieve the desired results.

Should you consider contemplating a move to the cloud, a basic cross-checking of the services needs to be taken into account. Therefore, while users can scale services to fit their needs, customize applications and access cloud services from anywhere with an internet connection, the fundamental question remains whether you would want to choose the cloud computing service model from one of the following:

• SaaS: Software as a Service (Google Apps, Office 365, Salesforce, NetSuite)
• IaaS: Infrastructure as a Service (AWS, Azure, Google Compute Engine, Alibaba Cloud)
• PaaS: Platform as a Service (Heroku, Google App Engine, Engine Yard)

How to choose the cloud type from three basic options?

• Public:  Where the resources are entirely hosted by a cloud provider like Amazon Web Services (AWS)
• Private: Where one creates one’s own private cloud using a platform like OpenStack or VMware’s vCloud
• Hybrid: Where the resources are spread over both private and public platforms

With its healthy mix of on-demand reliability, high availability, security, and reduced operations costs, hybrid cloud implementations is an attractive option to choose from

It’s not money alone!

There are many other reasons for any organization to make a shift to the cloud. The primary among them are:
Disaster recovery, Ease of management, and Archival.

There are a number of cloud migration an enterprise can perform.

• One common model is the transfer of data and applications from a local, on-premise data center to a public-cloud
• However, a cloud migration could also entail moving data and applications from one cloud platform or provider to another – a model known as cloud-to-cloud migration
• A third type of migration is to un-cloud also known as reverse cloud migration or de-clouding—where data or applications are moved off the cloud and to a local data center

Other benefits

• Improved IT resource management
• Increased Mobility
• Larger talent Pool
• Collective IT insight
• Easier mergers and Acquisitions
• Reduced Carbon Footprints

An organization’s cloud migration process often involves merging an on-site IT infrastructure with a hybrid cloud solution, which may be accessed over the Internet for a fee. Hybrid cloud solutions transition between one or more cloud providers and usually provide on-demand and provisioned server space, applications, and services.

Cloud migration is critical for achieving real-time and updated performance and efficiency. Thus, cloud migration requires careful analysis, planning, and execution to ensure the cloud solution’s compatibility with the organizational requirements.

Authored Nandita Mathur is the Chief Strategy Officer and Head of Engineering at Q3 Technologies.