The use of the distributed cloud model for data storage and management is expected to become a strong trend on a larger scale. That is how distributed cloud usage is referred to as the way of the future, with 97 per cent of IT leaders polled by Volterra reporting plans to distribute workloads across two or more clouds. In this article, we propose focusing on how businesses should prepare for distributed cloud adoption while keeping several critical factors in mind.
In a Nutshell, the Distributed Cloud Concept.
The concept of a distributed cloud is straightforward, and we’ve already covered it in depth in our dedicated article. A distributed cloud is essentially a novel approach to data storage and management. Businesses can store their data in multiple data centres, each of which can be located in varying degrees of proximity to the end-user.
The ability to locate data in the manner the business requires distinguishes distributed clouds from public and hybrid clouds. Because distributed storage speeds up data access and transfers, it can promise increased bandwidth, dependable disaster recovery and data protection strategies, and cost-effectiveness. Aside from that, the distributed cloud infrastructure allows the processing of massive amounts of data rapidly.
While the distributed cloud aims to diversify data assets across multiple cloud environments, it also simplifies its management by providing a single control point. Because all operations, applications, or networks are governed by centralised cloud management, organisations can benefit from selecting multiple cloud infrastructures and data centres that meet their customers’ demands without additional hassle.
How Should Businesses Prepare for Distributed Cloud Adoption?
Starting with a distributed cloud adoption requires a clear strategy developed with a thorough understanding of potential pitfalls.
According to Volterra’s research, the main reasons why businesses consider moving to a distributed cloud are to meet compliance requirements, improve visibility and transparency, and leverage the best services from leading cloud providers.
At the same time, another study claims that the most difficult challenge to distributed cloud adoption is ensuring reliability and connectivity among multiple providers. That is, developing consistent operational experience is critical to making a distributed cloud work for the benefit of the business.
To better prepare for distributed cloud adoption, the company should take the following steps:
Create policies for data security and storage transparency. These policies are necessary for more effective distributed cloud usage, ensuring compliance, and achieving better visibility.
Automation can help to reduce human errors. Companies can ensure automated and algorithm-based data transfer by developing and deploying cloud-based robotic process automation applications, which will be managed by Business Intelligence (BI) software capable of making decisions based on previous outcomes. This is a better option for reducing human intervention in cloud infrastructure, streamlining routine operations, and optimising cost-effectiveness.
Contact a reputable cloud development company. When an experienced cloud development vendor supports your company, the process of distributed cloud adoption is less risky and more effective.
Things to Think About When Migrating to the Distributed Cloud:
The following are the critical considerations for businesses when deciding to use a distributed cloud.
1. Security: According to Volterra’s survey, 54 per cent of respondents cited security as their top concern when transitioning to a distributed cloud model. Despite all the advantages of using distributed clouds, ensuring their security is more complex than public, private, or hybrid clouds. More data stored in multiple data centres means more access options for employees from various departments, more complex use cases, and more dependencies.
2. Data location: The core feature of a distributed cloud is that the company can distribute data across multiple data centres, achieving a data transfer speed that is effective for managing daily tasks. Similarly, solutions with low latency that are not critical for business operations can store their data closer to the end-user.
The next consideration on the path to distributed cloud adoption is data location and mapping, which will vary depending on the application’s specifics, the speed of data transfer required, and the level of data protection required.
3. Transparency in data storage: Businesses and their customers want more cloud data transparency. Both are concerned about how the cloud service provider stores their data across multiple locations.
As a result, to ensure data storage transparency for their customers, enterprises using distributed clouds should thoroughly understand how their data is stored and protected on the cloud service provider’s end.
So, we return to one of the challenges of distributed cloud adoption: ensuring reliability, connectivity, and clear communication between data centres sourced from various providers.
Conclusion:
Starting with distributed cloud adoption presents several challenges that businesses should be aware of. The primary ones concern the alignment of cloud services provided by multiple providers, as well as data security and transparency issues with data storage.
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