Know what your business specifically needs to optimize your multi cloud architecture
Over the past decade, we have seen digital transformation in almost every industry. Enterprises across the globe are increasingly looking to utilize multi-cloud offerings to take advantage of the best cloud development services in the market and reduce the overall cost of software development.
Today, multi-cloud adoption has increased drastically, with enterprises embracing digital transformation as the obvious course of action that can prepare them for the future. With that said, implementing a multi-cloud setup isn’t enough to take advantage of the choices and flexibility offered by its services. To keep up with the latest requirements of your business, it is important to know now what your business specifically needs to optimize your multi-cloud architecture. Signing up for cloud consulting from managed IT service providers like us will help you find the right strategies to optimize your multi-cloud architecture according to the requirements of your business. To get a better idea of what you should expect during multi-cloud optimization, read on-
Understanding Multi-cloud environment
A multi-cloud environment offers services from more than one public cloud service provider by combining services from various providers to meet an organization’s technical and business requirements. Generally, Multi-cloud solutions combine Software-as-a-service (SaaS), Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) deployments to create a strategy that can empower, improve efficiency and optimize an enterprise’s IT and business operations. Research shows that businesses in the tech industry are now utilizing multiple clouds with a mix of different service types and delivery models. This does not come as a surprise anymore. For instance, Amazon Web Services (AWS), one of the most popular and widely used providers of on-demand cloud computing platforms and APIs has more than 90 different cloud products to choose from. This is a glimpse into an average cloud ecosystem, showcasing the increasing number of choices enterprises have to build and manage their cloud architectures. Enterprises can now pick the best multi-cloud model, combining both public and private cloud services, and regularly restructure and optimize them to meet the specific demands of their business. As the complexity of these systems rises, reviewing and updating multi-cloud management strategies regularly becomes a necessity.
Multi-cloud management strategy: How to do it right
To successfully manage a multi-cloud architecture, it’s vital to understand how cloud adoption would work in the first place. Generally, a multi-cloud environment is used to distribute the workload between private and public clouds. This structure also reduces the dependency on a single vendor and provides accessibility to the best of the lot for individual services. However, adding multiple environments from various vendors makes the system complex, affecting the performance, security, and cost of the multi-cloud setup. To manage this level of complexity, organizations should focus on getting a dynamic framework that focuses on up-gradation and optimization alongside other operations. Here are some considerations and steps from our cloud consulting experts for an agile cloud environment-
- Map your existing cloud setup
By mapping your existing cloud environment, you will be able to create an overall picture of the setup and identify opportunities for future optimizations. Mapping also reveals gaps in your current strategy if any and helps differentiate cloud services. Cloud mapping will also help evaluate your performance needs, pinpointing areas for improvement. You will also gain insight as to whether your data is better suited for a public or private cloud environment.
- Plan and proceed with your integration needs
Once your cloud environment is mapped, integration becomes easier. For planning your integration needs, start by determining your private cloud environments and how they interact with the public clouds from different vendors. Along with this, identify whether you need middleware to connect different services. To ensure seamless integration among private clouds, you may also need to reconsider your networking infrastructure across different sites and thus ensure high performance and availability. Additionally check if the third-party vendor publishes the APIs, making it easy for their services to communicate with others, before introducing it into your cloud environment.
Although there is no need for every service in your environment to be integrated, cloud adoption with integration will help with business continuity without wasting the opportunities presented by migrating to a cloud environment. Remember that seamless integration between applications and data is vital for critical job functions.
- Set up an automation framework
Automation is one of the more obvious benefits of cloud computing. However, when it comes to a multi-cloud environment, there are numerous factors to be considered. Although most large-scale enterprises have cloud automation tools, they may not necessarily be equipped with a framework that can match their scalability requirements. The best way to go about this is by focusing on your business and its specific needs. Understand where you spend most of your time, money, and efforts, and see if this is something that can be automated. By standardizing the rules for deploying various cloud environments in your automation plan, you can work with different cloud services and seamlessly translate the configuration rules to automate new deployments.
- Understand and strategize your networking needs
The network infrastructure may not seem like a critical factor in cloud computing. However, you must understand that in a simple cloud topology, the network infrastructure may suffer from some performance degradation compared to when using the non-cloud infrastructure. When connecting complex multi-cloud architectures, these minor performance issues may add up to cause real, significant issues such as high latency and service outages.
To avoid this, it is vital to come up with a strategy for building a cloud architecture that’s based on your future vision for your business. As there is no one-size-fits-all, your networking strategy will essentially come down to your exact needs. Additionally, you must also consider implementing services that can enhance your overall network such as colocation to improve performance benefits.
- Evaluate your potential for cloud adoption in the future
Having gained a comprehensive understanding of your cloud computing needs and current environment and capabilities, you can start strategizing and evaluating to introduce more services in the future. Along with setting up a framework for this, special focus must be rendered towards cloud security, for translation between business and IT frequently.
Planning for the future also helps in identifying individuals and teams who can develop ideas and control standards that can enhance the utility of cloud platforms and services. To evaluate your business’s potential for improved cloud adoption strategies, you can always reach out to managed IT service firms like Citrus. Our cloud consulting services can help set up a strategy, translate your business into a multi-cloud system and ensure business growth and continuity.
Final words
We know that many enterprises have already adopted some form of a multi-cloud environment for their IT operations. However, to enjoy exponential business growth, organizations must set up a framework for multi-cloud optimization regularly. For cloud consulting, cloud security, machine learning on cloud, and all other multi-cloud services reach out to our experts at Citrus Consulting today.
