Hybrid clouds and their benefits for the industry

According to a Flexera study, about 87 % of large companies with more than 1000 employees use hybrid cloud. What is it? Let’s have a look.

A hybrid or converged cloud is a combination of public cloud resources with a private cloud, for example, linking your office data center to a Microsoft or Google cloud. Virtual machines from the cloud will appear on the network as if they were physically located in the data center. This is made possible through a secure tunnel that provides remote access and blurs the line between on-premise and cloud data centers.

- How is hybrid cloud used?

First of all, it helps save resources and increase work speed. The computing power of a local data center is limited, and an external public cloud allows to scale the resources when needed. Cloud resources can be used as much as needed and can then just be turned off when the work is done. With this approach, there is no need to purchase and maintain expensive equipment. Also, it’s much faster: a public cloud can offer the required amount of resources within an hour, while it can take weeks to purchase and install your own equipment.

In addition, hybrid cloud enables efficient resource allocation. While a private cloud handles daily tasks, a public cloud can be used as a backup in case of high loads or for testing tasks.

- Are there any downsides to this approach?

Yes, and they are related to the issue of integrating cloud solutions with each other. For example, incompatibility may arise when combining different technologies, or data may be lost when migrating an application from one cloud to another. Other possible disadvantages include the risk of an accident. The more complex the system, the higher the likelihood that there may be problems accessing the cloud.

- Solution examples

A retailer uses additional cloud capacity to test and launch new services. Upon successful launch, the new service moves to the local data center to be executed here. Worst case scenario, the use of resources in the cloud is simply canceled.

Considering the client’s desire to launch the new service without having to wait for the equipment to be ordered and delivered, the hybrid approach allowed launching the service immediately with the ability to migrate and scale computing power.

One of the customers was able to quickly recover important information after a fire in a local data center. Cloud capacities not only stored the data, but also allowed the deployment of temporary servers to provide customers with the desired service.