“Disruption should drive digitalisation and cloud uptake rather than hindering it.”
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Sal Laher, Chief Digital & Information Officer at global enterprise software provider IFS, reveals how a single strategy for cloud and digitalisation helps businesses maximise the rewards of growth.
Digitalisation equals transformation
Digitalisation and the business transformation projects that enable it are again on the radar for many businesses, particularly given the current macro-economics and potential recession being predicted. According to recent data from Research and Markets, The Global Digital Transformation Market size is expected to reach $1,302.9bn by 2027, rising at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 20.8% in the period 2021-2027.
This renewed focus on digitalisation is aligned to businesses accelerating cloud migration, including readily available SaaS solutions. The Flexera 2021 State of the Cloud Report finds 92% of enterprises have a multi-cloud strategy and 80% have a hybrid cloud strategy.
Sal Laher, Chief Digital & Information Officer, IFS
Both trends will go hand in hand as digitalisation and cloud migration continue to drive business efficiencies, process change and consumer service demands. Most organisations are aware of the potential rewards both business models can bring. This is because it is not the first time they are being talked about– this major transformational shift has already been in place for a decade. But some, wary of the disruptive impact of recent global events are holding back from implementing them. However, it is the wrong approach.
Disruption should drive digitalisation and cloud uptake rather than hindering it. Even in isolation, either moving to the cloud, or undertaking digitalisation, will enable faster decision-making, supported by greater compute power and more agile processes, generating faster output and enhancing customer service. Yet, to drive competitive edge, organisations need to combine cloud migration with business transformation and look to maximise those benefits. To do this, they must develop a single strategy covering both elements and move forward with a common approach.
Migrating to the cloud for business transformation
By digitalising, organisations have an opportunity to benefit from faster time to insight, enhanced business and customer connectivity, and operational efficiencies. It allows them to more easily collect and analyse data that they can later turn into actionable, revenue-generating insights.
Over time, they can go further and start to tap into the benefits of artificial intelligence, machine learning, big data analytics, and the Internet of Things (IoT). But it is the additional compute power and scalability of the cloud that helps them to maximise these benefits and fulfil the potential of digital technologies.
Cloud migration also includes adopting evergreen application (business process) solutions in the cloud with the many SaaS solutions that are available today. That’s why it is important that they adopt a single plan to migrate to the cloud and drive business transformation all in one. This tandem approach also avoids unnecessary customisation, making a business much more agile to change based on actionable data insights.
Adopting a single plan will, in itself, drive up efficiencies and drive down costs. But critically, the two must be linked to ensure that businesses maximise the benefits of the migration process.
It is cloud, after all, that helps businesses adapt to the new digital world, enabling them, for instance, to leverage out of the box business applications, digital analytics tools and low code platforms that deliver informed decision-making and reduce costs. But cloud doesn’t just maximise the benefits for businesses, it also accelerates them. Cloud has become the fulcrum of digital transformation, mainly due to its ability to enable innovation at scale and allow businesses that have digitalised to rapidly launch enterprise-ready products.
Without cloud, businesses will struggle to drive through timely updates to systems and processes. The costs of stakeholder management may ramp up. Moreover, moving to the cloud without doing it within the step-by-step structure of digital transformation risks mistakes being made, increasing the likelihood of data loss and security breaches through misconfigurations.
Optimising the benefits of digital transformation in the cloud
We have seen how important it is to adopt a single strategy for cloud migration and digitalisation and to execute them in tandem. But organisations also need to maximise the benefits of the combined approach. So how can they best do this?
First, they need to avoid procrastination and delay. The benefits of digitalisation and cloud migration working together are compelling – and senior leaders need to seize the initiative and kickstart the transformation. To get the ball rolling, they need to conduct a benchmarking exercise to better understand where their business stands in terms of its capabilities or gaps. This will help to decide where efforts and resources should be focused.
They then need to align their business processes with IT. That’s key as modern business models increasingly emphasise the digitalisation of processes.
Cloud computing and network security concept, 3d rendering,conceptual image.
They should begin by determining their goals and the systems, technologies, and processes currently in use to achieve them. Next, they need to brainstorm and document core business objectives before developing a cloud and digitalisation migration roadmap to guide their implementation. Measuring performance will also be crucial to optimising results. In choosing which metrics to analyse, organisations should concentrate on those that will most positively impact their bottom line or user experience.
Ensuring employees buy into the process of cloud-based digitalisation will also be key. Organisations should use cloud-based digitalisation as an opportunity to strengthen business processes and help employees switch to new ways of working which maximise the potential of the new technology.
Digital readiness
Given all this, it is vital businesses don’t delay on their journey to digital and the cloud. Unfortunately, CIOs often struggle to know where to start with a cloud and digital migration strategy.
Before they begin, they often look to put a complete strategy in place up front. The truth is that it is not necessary. Instead, they need to get going and prioritise what’s most important. Pick one area, settle on a use case, digitalise, and move it to the cloud, demonstrate results – and then repeat incrementally. That will enable the business to showcase value and create momentum. Over time also, this single coordinated approach, will allow it to tap into a wide range of cloud and digitalisation related benefits – and ultimately to maximise the rewards.
Expert analysis of the tech trends set to make waves this year
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Digital transformation is a continuing journey of change with no set final destination. This makes predicting tomorrow a challenge when no one has a crystal ball to hand.
After a difficult few years for most businesses following a disruptive pandemic and now battling a cost-of-living crisis, many enterprises are increasingly leveraging new types of technology to gain an edge in a disruptive world.
With this in mind, here are what experts predict for the next 12 months…
1. Process Mining
Sam Attias, Director of Product Marketing at Celonis, expects to see a rise in the adoption of process mining as it evolves to incorporate automation capabilities. He says process mining has traditionally been “a data science done in isolation” which helps companies identify hidden inefficiencies by extracting data and visually representing it.
“It is now evolving to become more prescriptive than descriptive and will empower businesses to simulate new methods and processes in order to estimate success and error rates, as well as recommend actions before issues actually occur,” says Attias. “It will fix inefficiencies in real-time through automation and execution management.”
2. The evolution of social robots
Gabriel Aguiar Noury, Robotics Product Manager at Canonical, anticipates social robots to return this year. After companies such as Sony introduced robots like Poiq, Aguiar Noury believes it “sets the stage” for a new wave of social robots.
“Powered by natural language generation models like GPT-3, robots can create new dialogue systems,” he says. “This will improve the robot’s interactivity with humans, allowing robots to answer any question.
“Social robots will also build narratives and rich personalities, making interaction with users more meaningful. GPT-3 also powers Dall-E, an image generator. Combined, these types of technologies will enable robots not only to tell but show dynamic stories.”
3. The rebirth of new data-powered business applications
Christian Kleinerman, Senior Vice President of Product at Snowflake, says there is the beginning of a “renaissance” in software development. He believes developers will bring their applications to central combined sources of data instead of the “traditional approach” of copying data into applications.
“Every single application category, whether it’s horizontal or specific to an industry vertical, will be reinvented by the emergence of new data-powered applications,” affirms Kleinerman. “This rise of data-powered applications will represent massive opportunities for all different types of developers, whether they’re working on a brand-new idea for an application and a business based on that app, or they’re looking for how to expand their existing software operations.”
4. Application development will become a two-way conversation
Adrien Treuille, Head of Streamlit at Snowflake, believes application development will become a two-way conversation between producers and consumers. It is his belief that the advent of easy-to-use low-code or no-code platforms are already “simplifying the building” and sharing of interactive applications for tech-savvy and business users.
“Based on that foundation, the next emerging shift will be a blurring of the lines between two previously distinct roles — the application producer and the consumer of that software.”
He adds that application development will become a collaborative workflow where consumers can weigh in on the work producers are doing in real-time. “Taking this one step further, we’re heading towards a future where app development platforms have mechanisms to gather app requirements from consumers before the producer has even started creating that software.”
5. The Metaverse
Paul Hardy, EMEA Innovation Officer at ServiceNow, says he expects business leaders to adopt technologies such as the metaverse in 2023. The aim of this is to help cultivate and maintain employee engagement as businesses continue working in hybrid environments, in an increasingly challenging macro environment.
“Given the current economic climate, adoption of the metaverse may be slow, but in the future, a network of 3D virtual worlds will be used to foster meaningful social connections, creating new experiences for employees and reinforcing positive culture within organisations,” he says. “Hybrid work has made employee engagement more challenging, as it can be difficult to communicate when employees are not together in the same room.
“Leaders have begun to see the benefit of hosting traditional training and development sessions using VR and AI-enhanced coaching. In the next few years, we will see more workplaces go a step beyond this, for example, offering employees the chance to earn recognition in the form of tokens they can spend in the real or virtual world, gamifying the experience.”
6. The year of ESG?
Cathy Mauzaize, Vice President, EMEA South, at ServiceNow, believes 2023 could be the year that environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) is vital to every company’s strategy.
“Failure to engage appropriate investment in ESG strategies could plunge any organisation into a crisis,” she says. “Legislation must be respected and so must the expectations of employees, investors and your ecosystem of partners and customers.
“ESG is not just a tick box, one and done, it’s a new way of business that will see us through 2023 and beyond.”
7. Macro Trends and Redeploying Budgets for Efficiency
Ulrik Nehammer, President, EMEA at ServiceNow, says organisations are facing an incredibly complex and volatile macro environment. Nehammer explains as the world is gripped by soaring inflation, intelligent digital investments can be a huge deflationary force.
“Business leaders are already shifting investment focus to technologies that will deliver outcomes faster,” he says. “Going into 2023, technology will become increasingly central to business success – in fact, 95% of CEOs are already pursuing a digital-first strategy according to IDC’s CEO survey, as digital companies deliver revenue growth far faster than non-digital ones.”
8. Organisations will have adopted a NaaS strategy
David Hughes, Aruba’s Chief Product and Technology Officer, believes that by the end of 2023, 20% of organisations will have adopted a network-as-a-service (NaaS) strategy.
“With tightening economic conditions, IT requires flexibility in how network infrastructure is acquired, deployed, and operated to enable network teams to deliver business outcomes rather than just managing devices,” he says. “Migration to a NaaS framework enables IT to accelerate network modernisation yet stay within budget, IT resource, and schedule constraints.
“In addition, adopting a NaaS strategy will help organisations meet sustainability objectives since leading NaaS suppliers have adopted carbon-neutral and recycling manufacturing strategies.”
9. Think like a seasonal business
According to Patrick Bossman, Product Manager at MariaDB corporation, he anticipates 2023 to be the year that the ability to “scale out on command” is going to be at the fore of companies’ thoughts.
“Organisations will need the infrastructure in place to grow on command and scale back once demand lowers,” he says. “The winners in 2023 will be those who understand that all business is seasonal, and all companies need to be ready for fluctuating demand.”
10. Digital platforms need to adapt to avoid falling victim to subscription fatigue
Demed L’Her, Chief Technology Officer at DigitalRoute, suggests what the subscription market is going to look like in 2023 and how businesses can avoid falling victim to ‘subscription fatigue’. L’Her says there has been a significant drop in demand since the pandemic.
“Insider’s latest research shows that as of August, nearly a third (30%) of people reported cancelling an online subscription service in the past six months,” he reveals. “This is largely due to the rising cost of living experienced globally that is leaving households with reduced budgets for luxuries like digital subscriptions. Despite this, the subscription market is far from dead, with most people retaining some despite tightened budgets.
“However, considering the ongoing economic challenges, businesses need to consider adapting if they are to be retained by customers in the long term. The key to this is ensuring that the product adds value to the life of the customer.”
11. Waking up to browser security
Jonathan Lee, Senior Product Manager at Menlo Security, points to the web browser being the biggest attack surface and suggests the industry is “waking up” to the fact of where people spend the most time.
“Vendors are now looking at ways to add security controls directly inside the browser,” explains Lee. “Traditionally, this was done either as a separate endpoint agent or at the network edge, using a firewall or secure web gateway. The big players, Google and Microsoft, are also in on the act, providing built-in controls inside Chrome and Edge to secure at a browser level rather than the network edge.
“But browser attacks are increasing, with attackers exploiting new and old vulnerabilities, and developing new attack methods like HTML Smuggling. Remote browser isolation is becoming one of the key principles of Zero Trust security where no device or user – not even the browser – can be trusted.”
12. The year of quantum-readiness
Tim Callan, Chief Experience Officer at Sectigo, predicts that 2023 will be the year of quantum-readiness. He believes that as a result of the standardisation of new quantum-safe algorithms expected to be in place by 2024, this year will be a year of action for government bodies, technology vendors, and enterprise IT leaders to prepare for the deployment.
“In 2022, the US National Institute of Standards and Technologies (NIST) selected a set of post-quantum algorithms for the industry to standardise on as we move toward our quantum-safe future,” says Callan.
“In 2023, standards bodies like the IETF and many others must work to incorporate these algorithms into their own guidelines to enable secure functional interoperability across broad sets of software, hardware, and digital services. Providers of these hardware, software, and service products must follow the relevant guidelines as they are developed and begin preparing their technology, manufacturing, delivery, and service models to accommodate updated standards and the new algorithms.”
13. AI: fewer keywords, greater understanding
AI expert Dr Pieter Buteneers, Director of AI and Machine Learning at Sinch, expects artificial intelligence to continue to transition away from keywords and move towards an increased level of understanding.
“Language-agnostic AI, already existent within certain AI and chatbot platforms, will understand hundreds of languages — and even interchange them within a single search or conversation — because it’s not learning language like you or I would,” he says. “This advanced AI instead focuses on meaning, and attaches code to words accordingly, so language is more of a finishing touch than the crux of a conversation or search query.
“Language-agnostic AI will power stronger search results — both from external (the internet) and internal (a company database) sources — and less robotic chatbot conversations, enabling companies to lean on automation to reduce resources and strain on staff and truly trust their AI.”
14. Rise in digital twin technology in the enterprise
John Hill, CEO and Founder of Silico, recognises the growing influence digital twin technology is having in the market. Hill predicts that in the next 20 years, there will be a digital twin of every complex enterprise in the world and anticipates the next generation of decision-makers will routinely use forward-looking simulations and scenario analytics to plan and optimise their business outcomes.
“Digital twin technology is one of the fastest-growing facets of industry 4.0 and while we’re still at the dawn of digital twin technology,” he explains. “Digital twins will have huge implications for unlocking our ability to plan and manage the complex organisations so crucial for our continued economic progress and underpin the next generation of Intelligent Enterprise Automation.”
15. Broader tech security
With an exponential amount of data at companies’ fingertips, Tricentis CEO, Kevin Thompson says the need for investment in secure solutions is paramount.
“The general public has become more aware of the access companies have to their personal data, leading to the impending end of third-party cookies, and other similar restrictions on data sharing,” he explains. “However, security issues still persist. The persisting influx of new data across channels and servers introduces greater risk of infiltration by bad actors, especially for enterprise software organisations that have applications in need of consistent testing and updates. The potential for damage increases as iterations are being made with the expanding attack surface.
“Now, the reality is a matter of when, not if, your organisation will be the target of an attack. To combat this rising security concern, organisations will need to integrate security within the development process from the very beginning. Integrating security and compliance testing at the upfront will greatly reduce risk and prevent disruptions.”
16. Increased cyber resilience
Michael Adams, CISO at Zoom, expects an increased focus on cyber resilience over the next 12 months. “While protecting organisations against cyber threats will always be a core focus area for security programs, we can expect an increased focus on cyber resilience, which expands beyond protection to include recovery and continuity in the event of a cyber incident,” explains Adams.
“It’s not only investing resources in protecting against cyber threats; it’s investing in the people, processes, and technology to mitigate impact and continue operations in the event of a cyber incident.”
17. Ransomware threats
As data leaks become increasingly common place in the industry, companies face a very real threat of ransomware. Michal Salat, Threat Intelligence Director at Avast, believes the time is now for businesses to protect themselves or face recovery fees costing millions of dollars.
“Ransomware attacks themselves are already an individual’s and businesses’ nightmare. This year, we saw cybergangs threatening to publicly publish their targets’ data if a ransom isn’t paid, and we expect this trend to only grow in 2023,” says Salat. “This puts people’s personal memories at risk and poses a double risk for businesses. Both the loss of sensitive files, plus a data breach, can have severe consequences for their business and reputation.”
18. Intensified supply chain attacks
Dirk Schrader, VP of security research at Netwrix, believes supply chain attacks are set to increase in the coming year. “Modern organisations rely on complex supply chains, including small and medium businesses (SMBs) and managed service providers (MSPs),” he says.
“Adversaries will increasingly target these suppliers rather than the larger enterprises knowing that they provide a path into multiple partners and customers. To address this threat, organisations of all sizes, while conducting a risk assessment, need to take into account the vulnerabilities of all third-party software or firmware.”
19. A greater need to manage volatility
Paul Milloy, Business Consultant at Intradiem, stresses the importance of managing volatility in an ever-moving market. Milloy believes bosses can utilise data through automation to foresee potential problems before they become issues.
“No one likes surprises. Whilst Ben Franklin suggested nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes, businesses will want to automate as many of their processes as possible to help manage volatility in 2023,” he explains. “Data breeds intelligence, and intelligence breeds insight. Managers can use the data available from workforce automation tools to help them manage peaks and troughs better to avoid unexpected resource bottlenecks.”
20. A human AI co-pilot will still be needed
Artem Kroupenev, VP of Strategy at Augury, predicts that within the next few years, every profession will be enhanced with hybrid intelligence, and have an AI co-pilot which will operate alongside human workers to deliver more accurate and nuanced work at a much faster pace.
“These co-pilots are already being deployed with clear use cases in mind to support specific roles and operational needs, like AI-driven solutions that enable reliability engineers to ensure production uptime, safety and sustainability through predictive maintenance,” he says. “However, in 2023, we will see these co-pilots become more accurate, more trusted and more ingrained across the enterprise.
“Executives will better understand the value of AI co-pilots to make critical business decisions, and as a key competitive differentiator, and will drive faster implementation across their operations. The AI co-pilot technology will be more widespread next year, and trust and acceptance will increase as people see the benefits unfold.”
21. Building the right workplace culture
Harnessing a positive workplace culture is no easy task but in 2023 with remote and hybrid working now the norm, it brings with it new challenges. Tony McCandless, Chief Technology Officer at SS&C Blue Prism, is well aware of the role organisational culture can play in any digital transformation journey.
“Workers are the heart of an organisation, so without their buy in, no digital transformation initiative stands a chance of success,” explains McCandless. “Workers drive home business objectives, and when it comes to digital transformation, they are the ones using, implementing, and sometimes building automations. Curiosity, innovation, and the willingness to take risks are essential ingredients to transformative digitalisation.
“Businesses are increasingly recognising that their workers play an instrumental role in determining whether digitalisation initiatives are successful. Fostering the right work environment will be a key focus point for the year ahead – not only to cultivate buy-in but also to improve talent retention and acquisition, as labor supply issues are predicted to continue into 2023 and beyond.”
22. Cloud cover to soften recession concerns
Amid a cost-of-living crisis and concerns over any potential recession as a result, Daniel Thomasson, VP of Engineering and R&D at Keysight Technologies, says more companies will shift data intensive tasks to the cloud to reduce infrastructure and operational costs.
“Moving applications to the cloud will also help organisations deliver greater data-driven customer experiences,” he affirms. “For example, advanced simulation and test data management capabilities such as real-time feature extraction and encryption will enable use of a secure cloud-based data mesh that will accelerate and deepen customer insights through new algorithms operating on a richer data set. In the year ahead, expect the cloud to be a surprising boom for companies as they navigate economic uncertainty.”
23. IoT devices to scale globally
Dr Raullen Chai, CEO and Co-Founder of IoTeX, recognises a growing trend in the usage of IoT devices worldwide and believes connectivity will increase significantly.
“For decades, Big Tech has monopolised user data, but with the advent of Web3, we will see more and more businesses and smart device makers beginning to integrate blockchain for device connectivity as it enables people to also monetise their data in many different ways, including in marketing data pools, medical research pools and more,” he explains. “We will see a growth in decentralised applications that allow users to earn a modest additional revenue from everyday activities, such as walking, sleeping, riding a bike or taking the bus instead of driving, or driving safely in exchange for rewards.
“Living healthy lifestyles will also become more popular via decentralised applications for smart devices, especially smart watches and other health wearables.”
iland research reveals hidden pitfalls of hyperscale cloud and low confidence in key features of cloud services, while a lack of resources is holding back cloud migration projects for 83%
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iland, a leading VMware-based cloud services provider for application hosting, data protection and disaster recovery, today released the findings of its research into customer confidence in cloud services. It found that despite the increase in cloud adoption due to the pandemic, three quarters of organisations surveyed say hyperscaler IaaS instance types may not meet their cost and performance needs for mission-critical applications, while more than one in five are not satisfied with key features of cloud provision such as security, performance, availability and support.
The research also found that a lack of migration resources is delaying or preventing cloud projects for more than 80% of organisations surveyed.
The research: The Hidden Pitfalls of Working with Hyperscale Clouds was conducted among 501 senior IT executives, including CIOs, CISOs and CTOs, in the UK and US by independent research organisation, Opinion Matters, in June 2020. Participants were asked for their views on security, performance, compliance and their overall level of confidence in the cloud services they have invested in.
Key research findings include:
83% say lack of migration resources and/or time has delayed cloud migration. Among those, 12% say it has entirely prevented migration.
75% say a T Shirt size or hyperscaler instance type does not meet all their performance and cost requirements.
24% are not confident that hyperscale clouds can meet performance and availability requirements for specific applications.
23% are not confident that production data is protected via backup or disaster recovery in the event of data loss with their cloud service provider.
24% are not confident they can get the support they need from their cloud service provider.
53% say security is the top factor in cloud supplier selection.
76% agree CSPs should assist or actively manage customer data compliance.
Commenting on the research findings, Researcher Charles Moore said: “While cloud adoption has seen a significant uptick due to the pandemic, the lack of migration resources for many customers has delayed or prevented deployment. Customers need to choose a cloud vendor that can fill the internal resource gaps that can hinder success.”
Justin Giardina, iland Chief Technology Officer, added: “The business benefits of moving to the cloud are indisputable, but with 83% of those surveyed saying that migration resources are necessary to achieve those benefits it’s clear that customers need to look beyond just the cloud platform and ensure their vendor can offer the supporting services that can reduce risk and improve time to value.”
“Hyperscale cloud services are missing the mark for a significant proportion of the organisations surveyed,” continues Giardina. “Having trust in critical cloud features is fundamental to realising its benefits, so with more than one in five respondents lacking confidence in aspects such as performance, availability, backup and support points to the hidden pitfalls of hyperscale clouds.”
Security, management, visibility, and control are priority customer requirements for cloud solutions
The study also found that key requirements for cloud service provision include common or unified management across all services; this is a priority for 73% of those adopting multi-cloud solutions. Similarly, infrastructure visibility and control are must-have features for 71% of respondents. Many were looking to the future, with 89% saying it was important or critical that they can write to their CSP’s API for future software development and deployment.
Security is a primary criterion for cloud provider selection, with 53% saying it is the leading consideration and a further 43% saying it is a major factor. Three quarters of customers also want to see cloud service providers helping manage data compliance.
The survey found that the majority (74%) of respondents felt it was important that CSPs preserve their company’s existing networking environment when they move to the cloud. This reflects the current landscape, where many organisations are being forced to accelerate their cloud adoption programmes due to the pressures of supporting large-scale remote working. Giardina notes: “When organisations are being rapidly pushed out of their comfort zones and forced to shrink deployment schedules to the absolute minimum, being able to maintain the familiar networking environment in the cloud is an advantage that is appealing to under-pressure IT departments.”
Sarah Doherty, Product Marketing Manager at iland discusses how a cloud-based infrastructure can accelerate IT initiatives.
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There’s no doubt about it, we are living in a cloud enhanced world. No matter what is happening in life, whether it’s uploading pictures of the family, keeping track of friends on social media, or working remotely, the fact remains that the cloud is a part of our everyday lives in one way or another.
So why are organisations so hesitant to adopt a cloud infrastructure? From speaking with customers, the reason extends across infrastructure, business as well as, let’s face it, an overall new way of thinking about what is the best way to mitigate risk.
When we talk to business leaders, the idea of moving from a CAPEX model to an OPEX model is appealing for pretty much everything but IT. They still look at IT assets and think about budget cycles and performance/capacity per the pound or dollar. This can put them into situations where they are purchasing hardware on three to five-year cycles, subsequently discovering after two years that the hardware they have invested in isn’t doing what it needs to do. However, at that point, the business is committed.
They may be locked into a certain vendor or platform and the pain of moving seems overwhelming or they may have concerns about moving to the cloud in general. In a nutshell, this approach is not compatible with the flexibility and scalability that many businesses need in their toolkit.
The tangible business benefits of using a cloud-based infrastructure have been heavily publicised of late, with the onset of COVID-19 necessitating a quick and efficient move to the cloud, in order to keep businesses moving. However, implementing a cloud strategy to future-proof an organisation can, not only have top-line operational benefits such as data security, business continuity, resilience, scalability, and accessibility – it can facilitate wider digital transformation strategies.
This will prove crucial to maximising business efficiency and time-to-market of these initiatives, in the event of another worldwide event where physical access to a building is not possible. After all, an organisation’s end users have become accustomed to receiving a faultless service – even during a global pandemic – and would have expected businesses to have learnt their lessons from COVID-19.
Organisations wanting to implement a range of IT initiatives have unarguably accelerated cloud adoption. However, when choosing a cloud partner, they normally express the following concerns around adaptability to the cloud, which cloud providers need to tackle head-on.
Security and Compliance
While it may not be the first thing that springs to mind for IT professionals looking to quickly enact digital transformation strategies, such as building applications that will streamline internal business processes, security practices must adapt as data moves to the cloud. While assets are normally well-locked down, it is easy to accidentally create vulnerabilities in the cloud since customers are responsible for setting many security controls around their apps and data.
All clouds have a different set of best practices and design principles. Therefore, knowing those practices up-front will help cloud admins avoid headaches later. Working with the right cloud partner to plan and then execute a cloud strategy will not only eliminate headaches now and later but will also help to grow the business for the future.
It goes without saying that vulnerabilities must also be addressed as soon as possible. Cybercriminals are currently stepping up their attacks to take advantage of remote employees. Phishing attacks are at an all-time high on small and large businesses, as well as public resources like hospitals and healthcare providers. Therefore, businesses must assign responsibility to an individual or group of individuals to look after the organisation’s data from the onset, especially during the migration period.
There is no time like the present to reinforce an organisation’s IT security and compliance guidelines, many of which include the relevance of when employees travel or occasionally work from home. This includes a refresher on password policies and how to identify and report phishing attempts. It’s important to help employees with securing their home networks, and all the other policies and guidelines they would typically follow at work to protect the company and customer data. This might also be an excellent time to train employees on document and data retention best practices.
Cloud Expertise and Management
Most IT teams are running at full throttle as it is, and the idea of learning entirely new jobs, alongside current tasks, can be daunting. Furthermore, IT managers may be wondering how to firstly move their teams to the cloud, and subsequently get them up to speed quickly and manage projects in the long run, minimising business disruption as much as possible.
A good first step is to implement a robust cloud migration strategy. This will help communicate a clear vision and change management plans to all employees within the organisation, including IT teams at the coalface, demonstrating how the move to the cloud will really help the business, and prove ultimately beneficial in the long-run. For example, key drivers are the need for greater availability, the desire to move from CAPEX to OPEX and the need for greater scalability as the company grows.
Furthermore, the progression from traditional server-based infrastructure to virtualisation and then to cloud involves several mental leaps. The cloud requires an adjustment of mindset and an ability to accept ways of doing things differently. However, this is the only efficient way to take wider business and IT strategies forward. Organisations should start their move with non-mission-critical applications, which are typically the easiest to migrate. The transition of refactoring some applications to function as cloud-native or distributed applications can take more time.
It goes without saying that organisations choosing a managed service provider to manage their cloud migration and ongoing support should lean on their partner as much as possible, especially in the first few months, to help teams get up to speed with new processes and workflows.
It’s all about short term pain for long-term gain.
Cost Control
Understanding all the factors that contribute to billing before an organisation makes the move to the cloud is a must, since cost management changes can lead to problems if they are not understood.
Cloud services are generally billed once a month or follow a pay-as-you-go pricing model. However, users must factor in hidden fees, such as data transfer costs, and additional support and training. These budget surprises can pose a challenge if not addressed proactively.
Organisations should choose the cloud partner that doesn’t spring any surprising extra fees; the best providers should have simple, easy-to-understand invoicing portals and support, where businesses have complete visibility of all costs in one place. This is increasingly crucial as businesses scale their cloud offering up and down – sometimes on a month-by-month basis – with differing costs to reflect this. When scaling in such a way, organisations need to be made aware of how these changes will be billed – i.e. immediately or on monthly terms. Not addressing the finer points of billing can unnerve an organisation who are not familiar with cloud models, or a SaaS approach.
It is important to look past the challenges and focus on the true advantages. The cloud provides a great opportunity to modernise IT infrastructure and gain operational efficiency through cloud-native design practices.
All clouds have a different set of best practices and design principles. Therefore, knowing those practices up-front will help cloud admins avoid headaches later. Working with the right cloud partner to plan and then execute cloud strategies will not only eliminate headaches now and later but will also help businesses to grow in the future through planned digital transformation initiatives that can be executed without the constraints of legacy hardware.
In his latest opinion piece Justin Augat, VP Product Marketing from iland discusses how COVID-19 has accelerated the move from a ‘cloud first’ to a ‘cloud now’ approach for organisations.
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Recent market data from Synergy Research Group via CRN suggests 2019 was a milestone for IT and that for the first time ever, enterprises are spending more money annually on cloud infrastructure services than on data centre hardware and software. For example, total spend on cloud infrastructure services reached $97 billion, up 38 percent year over year, whereas total spend on data centre hardware and software hit $93 billion in 2019, an increase of only 1 percent compared to 2018.
This means that many companies that have historically owned, maintained, and managed their own IT operations in their own data centre are now evolving how they support their business operations by transforming their IT to cloud.
Moreover, the cloud continues to be the foundation upon which most organisations’ digital transformation efforts are built, with more than eight out of ten businesses considering the cloud to be either important or crucial to their digital strategies.
What are the key reasons underpinning this shift to cloud? Much of it is based on the modern organisation’s need for greater agility and flexibility. There has never been a better example of this demand than demonstrated during this COVID-19 pandemic, as companies have hastily decamped employees to home working.
Likewise, employees today want the ability to work from anywhere and to collaborate with colleagues as easily as they would in person. Even before COVID-19 led to a new remote workforce springing up almost overnight, a growing number of business leaders understood the importance of flexible working. Globally, 50 percent of employees work outside of their main office headquarters for at least 2.5 days a week, with 85 percent saying that productivity has increased in their business as a result of greater flexibility. In addition, more than 16 percent of companies worldwide now only hire remote teams. The cloud enables this freedom to work remotely.
However, until recently organisations have historically looked at only new application development and deployment for cloud, taking a ‘cloud first’ approach. But now, accelerated by the demands of the modern workforce combined with the ongoing effects of COVID-19, many are pivoting towards a ‘cloud now’ approach. In the months and years to come we will see more organisations embracing agile working and digital technologies, now they have seen a cloud-enabled workforce in action.
What do we mean when we talk about ‘cloud now’?
It means that companies are now looking at cloud for more than just new applications, they are considering cloud for all their applications, including existing ones.
The reason for this is straightforward: companies are focused on reducing costs and eliminating the dependency on the physical data centre is a logical next step in the continuation of this long-term trend. For as long as customers have been buying technology to support business, they have been using it to reduce costs and speed up time-to-market inside the data centre. Technology capabilities including server and storage virtualisation have improved IT’s ability to respond quickly to lines of business. But, over time, the ability of new technology to further reduce costs and time-to-market is diminishing.
This is a result of the growing customer demand for more application resources, better performance, and increasing frequency of administrative tasks such as patching various components, and planning for end of life or performance upgrades. Likewise, as mentioned earlier, with a global and increasingly remote workforce needing access to their applications from anywhere, this is also fuelling demand. As businesses have reached this inflexion point of diminishing returns, they have turned their strategy to the cloud as the next frontier of IT efficiency, leaving the data centre firmly behind in pursuit of their ‘cloud now’ strategy.
But today there are hundreds, if not thousands, of cloud services available to organisations. In many cases, the capabilities of the service, adjusted for cost, are what matter most to the decision makers versus the infrastructure itself. As an example, the underlying infrastructure that supports common business software such as Salesforce, Microsoft Office 365, is rarely scrutinised, as the products are trusted solely based on the brand’s reputation.
But in the case of organisations moving their existing applications to the cloud for production hosting (IaaS), backup (backup as a service) or Disaster Recovery (DRaaS) the underlying platform must be vetted to ensure the application needs will be met. To do this, organisations must examine the capabilities at the platform level. This is where the technology resources that have been purchased come together to deliver the application performance, security, compliance and connectivity, and more, of the selected service. Ultimately, it is these consumed resources that directly impact the cost of the service.
In general, the main cloud platform types that are most popular and available to customers at scale are public cloud, private cloud, and bare-metal cloud. They all have their merits and downsides and choosing the right cloud will very much depend on the customer’s requirements, as different aspects of these multitude of cloud products will best meet particular application and organisational needs.
Ultimately, as more customers embrace the cloud for more of their workloads, the varying requirements of these workloads can lead to trade-offs in cost versus performance, which defeats businesses’ main objectives when moving out of the data centre and into the cloud. As a result, customers need to understand a cloud provider’s overall capabilities early to avoid missed expectations in the future as it is clear that not all IaaS providers are the same.
So, as organisations embark on their ‘cloud now’ approach, they should undertake due diligence upfront to thoroughly consider their own requirements and what type of cloud IaaS provider will best meet their needs both now and in the years to come. Without a doubt we will see more organisations embracing agile working and digital technologies, now that they’ve witnessed a cloud-enabled workforce in action during COVID-19.
As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, we are witnessing an unprecedented increase in home working, which requires remote access for tools and communications to conduct our daily jobs. This disruption is putting IT infrastructures at risk, while validating much of the industry’s investment in business continuity, resilience, scalability, accessibility, data protection and security.
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With a global at-home workforce now entirely in place, what can IT professionals and CIOs do to ensure their private and public clouds can keep up and remain safe? And what steps and tests should they take to support a protracted change in the way we work? According to a recent Gartner survey, more than 74 percent of CFOs and business finance leaders expect at least five percent of their workforce will never return to their usual office workspace — becoming permanent work-from-home employees after the pandemic ends.
Even in the face of a global pandemic, we continue to promote a culture that requires easy and instant access to our tools, information and each other over cloud collaboration tools like Slack, Google Drive, Office 365, Microsoft Teams, as well as in-house applications.
This demand on IT requires private, public and hybrid clouds to have the agility, scalability and security to support entire workforces no matter where they are. IT leaders who have planned for this worst-case scenario are ready to scale at a moment’s notice. Likewise, they’ve already considered the impact on licensing, vulnerability and added traffic from employees working at home over personal devices and unsecured networks.
IT professionals who support an at-home workforce need to understand the difference between employees “running” applications and “accessing” applications. When technology is set up and configured correctly, it should be easy to access. That’s the whole idea of SaaS and cloud. The challenge is, how do you administer it? How do you run it?
Organisations that maintain private clouds onsite, which might not be accessible during stay-at-home orders, need a plan to make repairs physically — like swapping hard drives, replacing switches or cables — when their employees are home.
Likewise, whether at home or work, the end-user experience should be the same. If all apps and tools are optimal in an office environment, how do you make those adjustments ahead of time, so remote employees still have the same access and capabilities as if they’re working in the office? And how do you maintain your security and IT compliance obligations?
Where and how to start?
The easiest advice might be to avoid trying to boil the ocean all at once. If your applications and data aren’t on the cloud already, it’s possible to mobilise secure VPNs and encrypt applications for mobile devices. If you’re on the cloud already, you’re several steps ahead of others. But you still need to work with your cloud service provider to review your workloads, applications, and data requirements.
At the same time you’re focusing on accessibility, remember to address your vulnerabilities. Right now, cybercriminals are stepping up their attacks to take advantage of remote employees. Phishing attacks are at an all-time high on small and large businesses, as well as public resources like hospitals and healthcare providers.
Now’s the time to reinforce your organisation’s IT security and compliance guidelines, many of which include the relevance of when employees travel or occasionally work from home. This includes a refresher on password policies and how to identify and report phishing attempts. Help employees with securing their home networks, and all the other policies and guidelines they would typically follow at work to protect your company and customer data. This might also be an excellent time to train employees on document and data retention best practices.
COVID-19 will create additional security threats as attackers attempt to take advantage of employees spending more time online while at home and working in unfamiliar circumstances. Some of the biggest threats associated with the pandemic include phishing emails, spear phishing attachments, cybercriminals masquerading fake VPNs, remote meeting software and mobile apps.
Above all, you must have the same level of resilience and redundancy plans in place for home working as you do for onsite, even if you are 100 percent in the cloud. It is important to recognise that the same problems that happen on a day-to-day basis when you’re in the office can also occur when the office is vacant.
Prepare for the new normal
Going forward, all businesses should plan for an eventuality like COVID-19 happening again. This means understanding data security, business continuity, resilience, scalability, accessibility and so much more. For example, you may not need extra capacity and compute power now; but you need to know that within minutes you can get to that number. And, as I mentioned earlier, a lot of organisations have internal-only networks to manage power supply, fans, cooling and switches. What if you can’t get into the building?
Futureproof and understand the boundaries between personal and company devices and assets. Understand what you need to put into place to protect your business and your employees.
And finally, companies that are leveraging cloud services need to communicate frequently with their providers to address future needs and concerns. Make sure you know what they can do ahead of time to keep your remote workforce operating. Hopefully, these circumstances will be short-term, and life will return to some normality soon, but my advice is to always plan for every eventuality and what may now be the new normal.
As UK businesses look towards the cloud to enable digital innovation, more than half (58%) say the move has been…
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As UK
businesses look towards the cloud to enable digital innovation, more than half
(58%) say the move has been more costly than envisaged, according to new
research from Capita’s Technology Solutions division.
However, the
research reveals that cloud migration (72%) remains the top transformational
priority for most organisations, ahead of process automation (45%), big data
analytics (40%), and artificial intelligence/machine learning (31%). This is a
further indication that organisations see cloud as a core component to
effectively enabling these next-generation technologies.
The ‘From Cloud Migration
to Digital Innovation’ report, which surveyed 200 UK IT decision
makers, cites reduced cost (61%), improved speed of delivery (57%), and
increased IT security (52%) as the main reasons for organisations to move to
the cloud. However, 90% of respondents admitted that cloud migration had been
delayed in their organisation due to one or more unforeseen factors. Issues
such as cost (39%), workload and application re-architecting (38%), security
concerns (37%), and skills shortages (35%) all point to a process that is more
complicated than expected.
“Cloud adoption is a critical foundational step towards opening up real
transformative opportunities offered by cloud-native technologies and emerging
digital platforms and services. While some forward-thinking organisations are able to keep their eye on
the goal, the complexity of the migration and application modernisation process
tends to introduce delays and cost-implications that slow down progress,” said
Wasif Afghan, head of Cloud and Platform at Capita’s Technology Solutions
division.
A more
complex and costly migration than expected
On average,
those businesses asked had migrated 45% of their workloads and applications to
the cloud. However, this did correlate to organisation size as organisations
with more than 5,000 employees have further to go, with less than a third (31%)
of workloads and applications migrated. This could be the result of having
larger, more complicated systems.
Nearly half
(43%) of respondents found security to be one of the greatest challenges they
had faced during their migration. A lack of internal skills (34%), gaining
budget approval (32%), and progressing legacy migration solutions (32%) were
other significant challenges organisations had faced.
In fact, half
of respondents found their organisation had to ‘rearchitect’ more workloads and
optimise them for the cloud than they had expected. Further, only just over a
quarter (27%) found that labour/logistical costs have decreased – a key driver
for moving to the cloud in the first place.
“Every migration journey
is unique in both its destination and starting point. While some organisations
are either ‘born in the cloud’ or can gather the resources to transform in a
relatively short space of time, the majority will have a much slower, more
complex path. Many larger organisations that have been established for a long
time will have heritage IT systems and traditional processes that can’t simply
be lifted and shifted to the cloud straight away due to commercial or technical
reasons, meaning a hybrid IT approach is often required. Many organisations
haven’t yet fully explored how they can make hybrid work for them, combining
the benefits of newer cloud services whilst operating and optimising their
heritage IT estate,” said Afghan.
A platform
for innovation
Despite some of
the challenges outlined in the report, the majority (86%) of respondents agree
that the benefits of cloud are compelling enough to outweigh its downsides. For
more than three-quarters (76%) of organisations, moving to the cloud has driven
an improvement in IT service levels, while two-thirds (67%) report that cloud
has proven more secure than on-premise.
Overall,
three-quarters of organisations claimed to be satisfied with their cloud
migrations. However, only 16% were ‘extremely satisfied’ – indicating
that most organisations have not yet seen the full benefits or transformative
potential of their cloud investments. In addition, 42% of respondents currently
believe that cloud had ‘overpromised and underdelivered’.
“It’s no longer enough to think
of cloud as simply a way to benefit from initial cost savings or just another
place to store applications and data. Today, the move to cloud is driving a
spirit of innovation right across the enterprise, paving the way for advanced
digital services to be rolled out in a highly accessible, faster and more
cost-effective way – whether that’s AI, RPA, complex data analytics or machine
learning. Only through the alignment of IT and lines of business leadership –
in terms of goals, vision, direction and mindset – can organisations fully unleash the potential of cloud to
address their key business objectives, whether that is improving business
agility, delivering an enhanced customer experience or enhancing business
efficiencies.” said Afghan.
As UK businesses look towards the cloud to enable digital innovation, more than half (58%) say the move has been…
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As UK
businesses look towards the cloud to enable digital innovation, more than half
(58%) say the move has been more costly than envisaged, according to new
research from Capita’s Technology Solutions division.
However, the
research reveals that cloud migration (72%) remains the top transformational
priority for most organisations, ahead of process automation (45%), big data
analytics (40%), and artificial intelligence/machine learning (31%). This is a
further indication that organisations see cloud as a core component to
effectively enabling these next-generation technologies.
The ‘From Cloud Migration
to Digital Innovation’ report, which surveyed 200 UK IT decision
makers, cites reduced cost (61%), improved speed of delivery (57%), and
increased IT security (52%) as the main reasons for organisations to move to
the cloud. However, 90% of respondents admitted that cloud migration had been
delayed in their organisation due to one or more unforeseen factors. Issues
such as cost (39%), workload and application re-architecting (38%), security
concerns (37%), and skills shortages (35%) all point to a process that is more
complicated than expected.
“Cloud adoption is a critical foundational step towards opening up real
transformative opportunities offered by cloud-native technologies and emerging
digital platforms and services. While some forward-thinking organisations are able to keep their eye on
the goal, the complexity of the migration and application modernisation process
tends to introduce delays and cost-implications that slow down progress,” said
Wasif Afghan, head of Cloud and Platform at Capita’s Technology Solutions
division.
A more
complex and costly migration than expected
On average,
those businesses asked had migrated 45% of their workloads and applications to
the cloud. However, this did correlate to organisation size as organisations
with more than 5,000 employees have further to go, with less than a third (31%)
of workloads and applications migrated. This could be the result of having
larger, more complicated systems.
Nearly half
(43%) of respondents found security to be one of the greatest challenges they
had faced during their migration. A lack of internal skills (34%), gaining
budget approval (32%), and progressing legacy migration solutions (32%) were
other significant challenges organisations had faced.
In fact, half
of respondents found their organisation had to ‘rearchitect’ more workloads and
optimise them for the cloud than they had expected. Further, only just over a
quarter (27%) found that labour/logistical costs have decreased – a key driver
for moving to the cloud in the first place.
“Every migration journey
is unique in both its destination and starting point. While some organisations
are either ‘born in the cloud’ or can gather the resources to transform in a
relatively short space of time, the majority will have a much slower, more
complex path. Many larger organisations that have been established for a long
time will have heritage IT systems and traditional processes that can’t simply
be lifted and shifted to the cloud straight away due to commercial or technical
reasons, meaning a hybrid IT approach is often required. Many organisations
haven’t yet fully explored how they can make hybrid work for them, combining
the benefits of newer cloud services whilst operating and optimising their
heritage IT estate,” said Afghan.
A platform
for innovation
Despite some of
the challenges outlined in the report, the majority (86%) of respondents agree
that the benefits of cloud are compelling enough to outweigh its downsides. For
more than three-quarters (76%) of organisations, moving to the cloud has driven
an improvement in IT service levels, while two-thirds (67%) report that cloud
has proven more secure than on-premise.
Overall,
three-quarters of organisations claimed to be satisfied with their cloud
migrations. However, only 16% were ‘extremely satisfied’ – indicating
that most organisations have not yet seen the full benefits or transformative
potential of their cloud investments. In addition, 42% of respondents currently
believe that cloud had ‘overpromised and underdelivered’.
“It’s no longer enough to think
of cloud as simply a way to benefit from initial cost savings or just another
place to store applications and data. Today, the move to cloud is driving a
spirit of innovation right across the enterprise, paving the way for advanced
digital services to be rolled out in a highly accessible, faster and more
cost-effective way – whether that’s AI, RPA, complex data analytics or machine
learning. Only through the alignment of IT and lines of business leadership –
in terms of goals, vision, direction and mindset – can organisations fully unleash the potential of cloud to
address their key business objectives, whether that is improving business
agility, delivering an enhanced customer experience or enhancing business
efficiencies.” said Afghan.
Neill Hart, Head of Productivity and Programs at Computer Systems Integration (CSI), speaks exclusively to The Digital Insight about how…
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Neill Hart, Head of Productivity and Programs at Computer Systems Integration (CSI), speaks exclusively to The Digital Insight about how the company has moved beyond simple systems integration and helps customers find and exploit a ‘perpetual edge’ in technology innovation and digital transformation. Click here to listen to the full podcast!
“As Head of Productivity and Programs at CSI and the head of enablement, I am the middle ground between strategy and execution. We take the company strategy, which is very much centred on digital transformation, and using utility or cloud computing, we take it to the market in a way that makes sense for our client base.
Companies will have three or four desired outcomes; grow the business, save money, innovate faster and to protect (data, reputation etc.). Traditionally it’s to save money. On-premise data centres require capex investment, you have to buy equipment, run it in a data centre and pay for electricity and power, operations etc. The offer of cloud or utility computing is that use what you need and only pay for what you use. You don’t pay a lot to the water company if you don’t turn the taps on. That’s the dream of utility computing or cloud computing is that you break away from the capex investment. It’s inflexible. If you run out of capacity with an on-premise data centre, you have to buy some more equipment and that takes weeks or months to arrive. With cloud, if you need some more you pay for more…”
IT service provider Getronics has formed a technology partnership with HeleCloud, a leading AWS Consulting and Managed Services partner for…
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IT service provider Getronics has formed a technology partnership with HeleCloud, a leading AWS Consulting and Managed Services partner for UK and EMEA , to enable the design, delivery and management of leading-edge AWS-based solutions for Getronics customers through a ‘centre of excellence’. While adoption of cloud services is growing rapidly among businesses across Europe, associated cloud skills are scarce.
HeleCloud, one of the UK’s fastest growing start-ups, provides businesses with the skills, knowledge and experience they need on-tap. Initially the partnership will focus on Europe, with Getronics’ sizeable presence in European enterprise and midmarket businesses affording access to customers through existing relationships, while targeting the following industry sectors: retail, travel and transportation, financial services, and healthcare. Leveraging HeleCloud’s AWS technical knowledge and experience, the two companies will create solutions designed specifically for each vertical sector, augmenting Getronics’ existing portfolio of services by enabling their delivery on AWS.
Solutions will include Technology Consulting, Managed Services, and Technology Training. Getronics Group Vice Chairman, Mark Cook, commented: “There is significant customer interest in and momentum towards public cloud services on the AWS platform. In adding AWS capabilities we are adding choice for our customers, which is absolutely the right response to their interest and public cloud’s current momentum.” Technology offerings will be delivered from the new Cloud Centre of Excellence, organised into seven areas of competence: Cloud Roadmap & Migration Cloud Security, Compliance & Governance Business Continuity & Disaster Recovery Big Data & Analytics Managed Infrastructure Managed Security & Compliance Cloud Technical Design Authority.
Steve Rosa, Getronics Vice President for Cloud, Infrastructure and Security, added: “Getronics provides genuinely end-to-end cloud-based solutions: we advise our customers on the best locations for their workloads, we run the transformation projects including application modernization, and we deliver the management of the full stack – all wrapped up in our security and compliance services.”
Dob Todorov, CEO and Chief Cloud Officer of HeleCloud said: “We are excited to establish this partnership with Getronics – one of the most successful and fast growing global IT business of our time, with impressive capabilities across a range of platforms. Together, we are much more than the sum of the parts, and we’ll innovate and build AWS capabilities to the benefit of Getronics customers.” While adding AWS capabilities, Getronics remains a Microsoft Azure partner, serving customers committed to Microsoft technologies or intent on establishing multi-vendor presence. Getronics also delivers private and hybrid cloud solutions from its own hosted private cloud platforms in 19 data centres across Europe coupled with investments running across North America.
By Johnny Carpenter, Director of Sales EMEA, iland If you serve on the board of a UK organisation, it’s likely…
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By Johnny Carpenter, Director of Sales EMEA, iland
If you serve on the board of a UK organisation,
it’s likely that digital transformation is high on your agenda as you look
strategically at futureproofing your business. A key part of that is ensuring
that the IT infrastructure supporting your company is functioning robustly as a
platform on which to build competitiveness, rather than a legacy anchor holding
back innovation and growth. Moving to an Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IAAS)
set-up is increasingly the way that companies aim to unlock potential and
enable more dynamic, flexible business processes.
The benefits of IAAS are clear: It’s flexible
and can easily scale as your business grows. It removes the burden of
maintaining legacy systems and allows the easy deployment of new technology
and, ideally, you only pay for what you use on a predictable opex basis; you won’t
be paying to maintain capacity that is rarely needed. It also allows you to add
on services such as analytics and disaster recovery-as-a-service and it’s the
perfect environment for the big data projects requiring large workloads and
integration with business intelligence tools.
All these drivers mean that boards can be under
pressure to quickly sign off on cloud migration projects. However, it could be
a case of more haste, less speed if boards don’t ask the right questions before
they sign on the dotted line. It’s important that decision makers don’t simply
view IAAS as a commodity purchase – there are a range of providers from
hyperscalers to vertical sector specialists and they’re not all the same.
Boards must undertake due diligence when making the IAAS decision and there are
some key questions that should be asked to ensure that the project delivers
both the operational and also the strategic outcomes required.
What’s the scale of our ambition and what
business outcomes do we want to see?
We tend to see cloud migration projects falling
into one of two camps. In the first, businesses simply want to “lift and shift”
their current operations and replicate them exactly in a cloud environment.
Naturally they want to see the benefits of cost and flexibility, but
fundamentally they want a similar experience after the migration to what they
had before. The second scenario sees companies wanting to fully overhaul their
infrastructure and deliver a completely different model back to the business –
more of a true digital transformation.
It’s important to know which camp you’re in and
be sure that your prospective IAAS provider is aligned, because in either case,
ending up with the alternative scenario will cause pain. What should be a
straightforward process becomes overly complicated when the destination is not
clear from the outset.
How much support do we require at
onboarding and ongoing?
Support for the initial cloud migration varies
between providers from do-it-yourself to a full concierge migration service.
If you opt for a hyperscale provider, you’ll
find the approach is more on the DIY side – there are a wealth of options but
it’s up to you to figure out what’s best for your business and mix and match
accordingly. This works if you have in-house capability or are happy to employ
consultancy expertise in order to manage the move.
At the other end of the scale are providers
offering an end-to-end concierge service to get you up and running with
onboarding, deployment and testing. Your IT team will be expected to bring
their existing skillsets, but little additional learning is required.
In both cases, you also need visibility of the
ongoing costs associated with support for your cloud environment and the
availability of that support.
What are our security and compliance
requirements and how will they be managed in the cloud?
Managing risk is a significant board
responsibility that only increases as regulations tighten. Company data is one
of the most high-risk assets the business possesses and its safety in the cloud
has to be beyond reproach. Prospective CSPs should be able to provide
assurances of the security offered by their cloud that meet or ideally exceed
the organisation’s compliance requirements.
Assurance at the start is one thing, but
ongoing auditing and reporting is also critical. The GDPR, for example,
requires that organisations demonstrate how they are taking steps to protect
data on a continuous basis and you’ll need to work with your CSP to achieve
this.
Again, offerings differ. Some providers will
expect you to take responsibility yourself, bringing your own security and
compliance team, software and processes with you. Others, including iland, have
built a dedicated practice around compliance that is at the disposal of
customers. This can be invaluable if your compliance team is small or you don’t
have in-house support. Either way, it’s another important consideration when
adopting IAAS.
Pricing – How flexible is flexible?
The lure of only paying for the resources
you use is a powerful motive for moving to IAAS. Whichever provider you choose,
it is likely to be more cost-effective than your legacy environment, but to
really reap the full economic benefits, you need to ensure that there’s a good
match between cloud workloads and cloud resource utilisation.
Some providers will allow you to reserve cloud
resources based on exactly the amount of GB required, with billing based on
actual compute usage, while other work on a “best fit” basis, offering a range
of predetermined instance sizes. There is a risk here of paying for resources
you don’t use, so it’s important to check that your requirements are close to
the instance size selected. You also need to ensure that you understand the
billing system and have visibility over any additional costs such as VPNs or
burstable charges that might be incurred. You certainly don’t want any nasty
surprises further down the line.
Fundamentally, adopting
infrastructure-as-a-service is a sound decision, but it still needs careful
scrutiny to make sure the business gains the maximum benefits possible. Even
though boards are under pressure to sign off deals, they should ask the right
questions to make sure their investment delivers the business outcomes they’re
looking for.
By Jake Madders, Co-Director at Hyve Managed Hosting It’s been 13 years since Google’s then CEO, Eric Schmidt, coined the…
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By Jake Madders, Co-Director at Hyve Managed Hosting
It’s been 13 years since Google’s then CEO,
Eric Schmidt, coined the phrase ‘cloud computing’ and since then it has changed
the landscape of both business and consumer IT. In fact, research recently
revealed 77% of enterprises have at least one application or
a portion of enterprise computing infrastructure in the cloud, highlighting its
immense popularity.
Although some businesses will go all-in with
either public or private cloud, this isn’t a model that works for everyone.
Different workloads and applications are suitable for different types of cloud
and this has driven the popularity of both hybrid and multi-cloud environments.
But what is the difference between the two and what are the benefits that they
provide?
Both hybrid and multi-clouds involve using a
mixture of public and private cloud to maximise efficiency, cost and
scalability – the differentiator is in how they are integrated and
managed.
Multi-Cloud
v Hybrid Cloud
Multi-cloud consists of a series of different
clouds that are centrally managed in a single architecture. These cloud
environments can be either public cloud, private cloud or a mixture of both and
are provided by a range of suppliers and therefore have to be managed
internally, adding to the responsibilities of the IT team. Operating in a
multi-cloud environment results in different configurations, settings, pricing
plans and multiple invoices – making management and budgeting more complex and
time consuming.
In comparison, hybrid cloud is a single entity
and consists of a combination of on-premises, private cloud and public cloud,
working together in tandem. This is provided by one supplier and means
businesses are operating within a single cloud infrastructure. As with
multi-cloud, the most appropriate cloud can be used for different workloads and
data. Having all of the operations within the same infrastructure unifies IT
and it can therefore be managed more effectively.
The
True Value of Hybrid Cloud
Hybrid cloud provides the best of both worlds
for businesses and working with a managed cloud provider means that the correct
workloads will always be in the most suitable environment. Public cloud will be
utilised for intensive workloads and is ideal for running test and development
servers, for example, and for sensitive data, the private cloud will be used.
Having this all centrally managed by an experienced managed cloud provider will
mean businesses can fully embrace the hybrid cloud model – avoiding the siloed
approach of multi-clouds.
Technology continues to drive supply chain change and innovation with Voxware, cloud-based voice and analytics supply chain solutions company, announcing…
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Technology continues to drive supply chain change and innovation
with Voxware,
cloud-based voice and analytics supply chain solutions company, announcing two
new strategic partnerships. The first is with Ai Links Limited – a Singapore
supply chain consulting firm – and the other with Onlog AS – a supply chain and
logistics solutions provider in Norway.
The second part of Total Retail’s series
on Tariffs and Inflation looks to the need to forward-buy inventory and the
benefits and disadvantages thereof. For those who missed the first part, it can
be found right here.
Another company looking to shift how its practices influence the
environment and deforestation is Olam
Cocoa. The company has revealed its plans to end deforestation in
its cocoa supply chain and to work with farming communities that depend on
cocoa for their livelihoods.
Energi Coast has declared the region’s supply chain as fit and ready for growth after an announcement of the Sector Deal for offshore wind. CEO of Tekmar Group and Chairman of Energi Coast, James Ritchie, said: “The sector deal for the offshore wind industry is a significant step forward in creating a sustainable industry and providing real value creation to our local supply chain, which is fit and ready to serve our growing sector.”
Inspecto has revealed its development of a nanoscale portable device that
can detect food contaminants in the field from an early stage. It can be
customised to detect contaminants per business requirement and is suited to
farmers, producers, suppliers, retailers and quality assurers along the supply
chain. It even provides results in real time.
ISSA’s
Cleaning Management Institute has partnered
with Marquette University to develop online training courses for the supply
chain. The programme is designed to enhance understanding of the fundamental
principles of the supply chain.
Also in the news today: Quantzig,
an analytics advisory firm, has announced their new article on the Importance
of Demand Analysis that highlights the objectives and helps businesses improve
supply chain efficiencies; retail imports have dropped
to an annual low with retailers between seasons and tariff hike on hold; the winners
of the first NextGen Supply Chain Awards have been revealed; EasyJet
is shoring up EU supply chain in case of no-deal Brexit; Chain Business
Insights released new book entitled Blockchain in Legal Cannabis: Weeding out
Supply Chain Inefficiencies; and Procter & Gamble’s supply chain to go
under the microscope
at Supply Chain Conference taking place towards the end of March.
The Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) awarded first place in the 2019 RTech Supply Chain Innovation Awards to Onfleet, a…
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The Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) awarded first place
in the 2019 RTech Supply Chain Innovation Awards to Onfleet,
a cloud-based software company that helps organisations refine last mile
delivery operations. Lisa LaBruno, RILA’s executive vice president of retail
operations and innovation said: “This year’s RTech winners not only embody the
spirit of innovation propelling the retail industry forward today, but they
have developed tangible solutions to some of retail’s biggest supply chain
challenges as well.”
Pepperfry, a furniture and home products marketplace, has announced its
intention to strengthen its supply chain operations to ensure improved customer
reach. The announcement comes alongside the company’s expansion plans as it
sets up more than 100 offline stores.
Singapore and US-based startup StaTwig
has revealed its plans to streamline the vaccine supply chain using its
blockchain-powered solution. The company is working with UNICEF – the company
distributes around four billion doses of vaccines globally – and is in talks to
continue with its expansion into new markets.
Agriculture retail sellers with a worldwide gross income of more
than $US 200 million may be required to disclose employment violations if
proposed legislation goes through in Washington. The Senate
Bill 5693 is directly targeted at removing slavery, peonage, working
to pay back debt and human trafficking.
IBM has announced that its hatches are being battened as the risk of a
no-deal Brexit looms every closer. The company is preparing for the loss of the
four freedoms of the EU – movement of goods, services and data, labour and
capital across borders.
Zebra
Technologies has released a report entitled
‘The Future of Fulfilment Vision Study’ that examines the logistics challenges
in an omnichannel shopping landscape. The report takes a global look at how
manufacturers, retails and logistics firms are meeting the growing needs of the
on-demand economy.
Ocado lost its flagship distribution centre in Hampshire in the last week
of February in a blaze that lasted for more then two days. It struck a blow for
the company as it was the prototype for its robotic plans for the future and
the loss from the fire is estimated at around £100 million.
Also in the news: Retailers
are asking congress to pass tariff relief legislation; a study by Alix
Partners examines the 2019 Global Container Shipping Outlook; and Revolut
– the bank plagued by misconduct and toxic working environment claims – is
fighting back.
The headline costs of cloud services from providers such as Amazon, Google and Microsoft appear to be remarkably good value….
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The headline costs of cloud services from providers such as
Amazon, Google and Microsoft appear to be remarkably good value. However, there
is more to running a service in the cloud than these suggest, and organisations
need consider the full picture to avoid an unpleasant shock when their first
bill arrives.
Public cloud is not a bad choice, but it is vital to prepare
a fully costed business case first, ensuring that all the ‘extras’ are
identified. Once an organisation has got rid of its in house infrastructure and
staff, it is very difficult to revert back, and once a cloud supplier has been
selected it is not straightforward to change. Different cloud vendors have
alternate approaches to configurations, with strengths and weaknesses that need
to be considered in line with business requirements.
The business case should consider three factors. First, what
is included in the proposed cloud service and its charging structure? If other
elements are required to safely run the application and are not included in the
core price, such as security, resilience, management, patching and back-up,
these need to be factored in. Second, what are the likely usage patterns? All
public cloud services are metered, which can be good or bad, depending on the service
and its use. Thirdly, how quickly is use of the service likely to grow, in
terms of both user numbers and data volumes? Flexibility is a strength of cloud
provision, but if the usage grows by 50% so do the costs and you have no choice
but to pay.
A useful analogy is to think of buying public cloud like renting a flat. You get access to the basic premises but need utilities, flooring and furniture to make it a home. In the case of the cloud, this includes management and monitoring of back-end components, backup, anti-virus and patching. As you are sharing the facilities with other residents, you need to provide locks for the internal doors and other security features. Also, fire alarm drills can be run at very inconvenient times when you have no choice but to vacate the building.
Take a service that you believe is primarily used between 8am and 6pm, such as customer relationship management (CRM). With metered cloud costs, hosting this in the public cloud can look significantly cheaper than the fully loaded internal costs of a service which is available 24×7. However, running CRM requires additional systems, such as login/authentication and security. These need to be powered up beforehand, and you need to back up the data, so 8-6 quickly becomes 7-7 or longer, especially if staff need to access it out of hours, which is almost always the case.
Then consider multiple interactive systems. Your CRM service
probably integrates with other systems which may not be able to be powered down.
By now you have probably concluded your organisation needs to run CRM 24×7.
Your costs are more than double the headline price and you still need to add security,
monitoring and management.
The second aspect requires an understanding of the applications you are planning to move. In public cloud services such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), it costs 1p per GB each time servers in different domains talk to each other, and 8p per GB to send data over the Internet. This seems minimal, but with some applications, servers have a constant two-way dialogue, or transfer ever increasing amounts of information, and costs can quickly escalate. Similar problems can arise when trying to put a custom application into Microsoft Azure. If an application is not optimised for public cloud, it may be more appropriate to retain it in-house or use a managed cloud service.
Finally, the service level agreement (SLA) and service delivery for cloud services may not match your business or user expectations. Businesses that have moved to cloud-based CRM systems have had outages and performance issues far worse than when running in-house solutions. Yet these are within the 99.9 percent SLA the cloud vendor stipulates (which is 8.77 hours of downtime per year plus maintenance windows). If a user calls your service desk saying why can’t I access CRM and when it’s there it is much slower, how do you explain that this is an improvement for the business and that there is nothing anyone within the organisation can do about getting the service back?
Now factor in the cost of migration, the sunk costs of your
existing IT infrastructure and facilities and the additional cost of a disaster
recovery solution (no cloud provider can guarantee 100 percent availability). What
was initially an easy cost justification becomes a more nuanced decision.
Some services can and should run in public cloud. If a cost
effective, fit for purpose Software as a Service (SaaS) is available, with
suitable SLAs to meet your requirements, it is likely to be a good option. However,
many providers currently offer something that is more like Platform as a
Service (PaaS), so you will need to provide some aspects of the service
yourself, use a managed cloud service, or retain the service in-house until a
suitable SaaS becomes available.
To prepare a watertight business case, the first step is to
baseline your existing IT provision against business requirements. This enables
you to categorise and prioritise the systems appropriate to be migrated to
cloud. You can then design new architecture for those services and plan the migration
before going to market, which may need external expertise. Most suppliers have
different cost models, but armed with this definitive blueprint you can make a
realistic comparison between the various offers.
The end result is likely to be a hybrid infrastructure that
needs managing and monitoring. You should therefore retain key skills in-house
to ensure effective management, security and cost realisation. For any cloud delivered service (public/private/hybrid)
you are still the owner of the data, therefore are responsible for information
security.
