The Cisco Global Cloud Index report reveals a major shift to cloud solutions. With 98 percent of all workloads expected to move to cloud-based solutions by the year 2020, the reality is that in the meantime, most organizations will have a hybrid IT solution in their work environment.
IT Life in 2020
The report includes some staggering projections about how cloud solutions will impact workload processing. Among that 98 percent that will move to cloud software, the bulk of it will be in public cloud spaces like Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure, with those two absorbing close to 70 percent of all workloads. The remainder will be in private cloud services.
How Hybrid IT is the Transition Solution
While the report predicts how cloud architecture will land in 2020, it doesn’t capture the current ways that IT professionals are managing the transition into cloud environments. The SolarWinds IT Trends Report 2017: Portrait of a Hybrid IT Organization is a report that details the current environment and how cloud solutions are impacting processing.
The report found that, though 95 percent of organizations indicated that they are placing some part of their processing in a cloud-based software, only one percent reported that they are 100 percent cloud-based.
What this means is that many companies are working on moving their workload processing to cloud solutions, but are doing it gradually. This hybrid IT solution includes some of the work being completed on-premise, while some is performed in a cloud solution. Overall, the IT department is responsible for the entire environment, including the Internet.
In some cases, companies are placing workloads in a cloud solution, only to find that they need to pull it back on-premise due to cost, workload speed or security. Many IT professionals find that the transition to cloud solutions is a trial-and-error process.
The Importance of Visibility in a Hybrid IT Environment
It’s critical that a hybrid solution allow the IT department to maintain authority over the environment, and that there’s a clear security plan between the organization and the cloud provider. What’s even more critical, however, is the inclusion of a visibility agreement. If an organization has an acceptable level of authority over their hybrid IT setup, but lacks visibility into their cloud software, they will face challenges in security and efficiency.
An organization that manages security and workloads without visibility is not effectively managing at all.
While the shift is far from complete, there’s clearly a massive move to hybrid IT and then complete cloud computing. To learn more about what you can expect from a hybrid solution, talk with AMD Technology. We want to be your partner and help you determine a solution for your unique business needs.