Cloud Adoption Strategies

In today’s competitive tech landscape, “IT organizations have moved past asking whether applications can be deployed or migrated to the public cloud.

Instead, they are commonly accepting the pace and innovation of cloud providers as foundational to their business.” says Elias Khnaser, VP Analyst at Gartner.

Companies that succeed in this new model do three things really well: anticipate where the market is headed, develop a strategy to keep pace and execute their plan.

This guide offers several actionable strategies for cloud adoption strategies to help your company stay ahead of the game.

The Role of Cloud Computing in the Enterprise

According to Gartner, By 2024, more than 45% of IT spending on system infrastructure, infrastructure software, application software, and business process outsourcing will shift from traditional solutions to the cloud.

Cloud computing is changing the way companies operate.

Enterprises are taking advantage of big data, automation, and serverless computing to re-invent their business model.

This new model empowers business agility and comes with the additional benefits of:

• Reduced Costs
• Accelerated Time to Market
• Expansion into New Markets

Companies adopting a serverless-based business model embrace serverless as “not a place but as a strategy" to drive innovation and competition.

Cloud Adoption Strategies: The Goal

Adopting serverless as a business model requires a unique approach. One that may differ from other technology implementations.

An effective strategy considers several factors to determine the best approach.

An effective strategy is one that maximizes the potential value of the service while minimizing costs.

In the end, a successful adoption strategy is one that aligns technology with the business. An alignment that embraces the two as the same endeavor to accomplish business objectives.

Below are the key adoptions strategies that will help achieve the best outcome:

1. Define Business Outcomes

Without understanding why you are adopting the service and what value it is providing for your business, you are just shifting your technology stack. says Jeremy Ward, Head of Cloud Advisory.

It is important for companies to understand how they plan to integrate this model to drive strategic initiatives.

A few common business objectives are:

• Cost savings
• Building new technical capabilities
• Scaling to meet market demands
• Integration of a complex IT portfolio
• Democratization and/or self-service environments
• Optimization of internal operations
• Increase in business agility

2. Plan the Entire Journey and Implement in Stages

Adopting serverless computing is not a “one-shot” deal where everything is moved at once. It can take years to integrate fully.

After determining business objectives, leaders must establish a roadmap. The roadmap should outline the current state of IT as well as the desired future state.

The desired future state should outline things such as:

• What data needs to be migrated and when
• What applications need to be shifted and when
• What businesses processes will be shifted and when

3. Address Potential Risks

Migrating to a serverless model is not without its risks. Leaders must assess these risks and plan for them. Common risks to consider are:

• Security and Compliance - In the cloud, data is entrusted to a third party and shares server space with other organizations. Leaders must determine if regulatory compliance requires stringent security protocols that must be implemented.
• Availability and Reliability - With cloud computing, the vendor handles all maintenance tasks. Companies should review the vendor’s Service Level Agreements (SLAs) to ensure their timelines offer the availability and reliability the company requires.
• Data Integration - Integrating data involves connections to various sources. Leaders will need to determine the appropriate interdependencies and ensure the availability of the data required.

4. Determine A Deployment Model

The deployment model defines how the cloud is implemented.

There are three primary models: Public, Private, and Hybrid.

Public

A public serverless environment is an IT model where computing and infrastructure are managed by a third party.

The vendor provisions these resources in a pay-as-you-go model to multiple companies.

It is a low-cost model that requires no maintenance near-unlimited scalability and high reliability.

Private

In a private serverless environment, services are owned and managed internally by the company.

They are used exclusively by one business. They can be physically on-premises or hosted by a third-party vendor.

This approach offers more flexibility in that your organization can customize the environment.

It also offers more control of the environment to enable higher levels of security and privacy.

Hybrid

The hybrid deployment model is a combination of private and public services.

Companies using this approach combine certain features of the public cloud with those of their private cloud.

For example, a company may run the data and applications in the private network, but the communication services are handled externally.

Many companies use this approach to have tighter control over data security and privacy with private networks while still leveraging some aspects of the public serverless environment.

5. Select The Right Service

Deciding the best type of cloud service is the next step in defining a strategy.

The type of service you choose depends on a variety of factors such as:

IaaS

With Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), a service provider hosts the infrastructure typically associated with on-premise data centers.

This includes servers, storage, networking, and virtualization.

SaaS

Software as a Service (SaaS) is one in which applications are delivered over the internet - as a service.

Rather than installing and maintaining software, the company accesses the application over the internet through a third-party vendor.

In this approach, the vendor manages access to the application and all infrastructure associated with it.

PaaS

Platform as Service (PaaS) is a solution to deliver development capabilities on the internet.

With PaaS, the vendor provides the platform, development tools, and underlying infrastructure for developers to write code and test their solutions over the internet.

Companies are increasingly using serverless computing to drive strategic decisions and innovation.

Adopting this fresh approach to business requires companies to define their objectives and carefully plan cloud adoption strategies to ensure success.

Contact us today to learn how we can help you achieve success on your digital initiatives such as cloud adoption and others.