Running your solutions in the cloud is the most effective and safest way to operate. You might have heard that one before, but what makes it true? And how do you navigate when regulations require a local setup? In this blog, we explore all opportunities and benefits of the cloud: for a faster time to market and to ensure business continuity.
1. Faster time to market with the cloud
First and foremost, implementing your solutions in the cloud accelerates your time to market. Choosing the cloud eliminates the need for physical infrastructure and complex setups, enabling software providers to roll out and configure solutions faster.
Cloud resources are available on-demand and can be activated with one click, as opposed to hardware that has to be specified, ordered, delivered and installed. This faster time to market also applies to running updates, which greatly improves the reliability, functionality and security of your solutions.
2. Ensure business continuity through the cloud
The cloud also provides powerful measures for business continuity. Rather than relying on a single physical server, a network of interconnected servers is being utilized. On top of that, cloud providers offer geo-redundancy – if one datacenter experiences downtime, others can instantly take over. These different availability zones ensure your environment is always up-and-running. It would be expensive and more complicated to replicate a similar system locally.
3. Use the cloud for a more effective operation
The investment to run a secure and well-functioning local environment can’t be underestimated. Hardware has to be replaced when its economical and physical lifecycle ends – typically every five years. To anticipate future growth, there is often more purchased than needed, but not having enough could also cause issues.
Using the cloud, you don’t have to invest in a fixed amount of hardware, which offers you more flexibility. Resources can be quickly scaled up and down to meet your business demands. All hardware maintenance is being handled by the public cloud provider.
4. The cloud improves your security posture
And of course, we can’t overlook the security benefits of the cloud. Outdated physical hardware often can’t support the latest software, creating a security risk. The cloud always runs on the latest standards.
Besides round-the-clock physical security of their datacenters, cloud providers also invest in a security operations center (SOC), to monitor the digital infrastructure 24/7. Thanks to their scale, they comply with multiple security standards (such as ISO27001 and ISO27017), which is challenging to match on a local level.
What if you’re required to have a local set up?
When talking about running solutions in the cloud, we mean operating fully online, as opposed to managing a physical infrastructure. It's a common misconception that you can't use the cloud when national regulations require data to remain within country borders. After all, public cloud datacenters are spread around the world. Fortunately, cloud providers allow you to choose geographic locations for storing your data. The availability of these cloud regions is growing, and allow you to use the cloud and still be compliant to local rules.
Why we choose the cloud
Most of our clients run our solutions in the cloud. It’s our proven method for a rapid go to market, while ensuring our clients align with modern (security) standards, at a competitive price. The cloud’s flexibility allows us to effortlessly scale resources as needed. Our solutions are secure by design, with solid technical and organizational measures in place to safeguard data security and availability.
Would you like to know more about our experiences with the cloud? Don’t hesitate to reach out!
