Castles in the Cloud: What Cloud Computing Holds for the Future

In a recent survey of 300 influencers, it was found that by, 2020, 83% of enterprise workloads will be in the cloud. Cloud data centers will be where the overwhelming amount of online content will be processed, everything from streaming videos to online searches, leaving traditional data processing centres in the dust.

Sebastian Velez, Director of Engineering at PSL, speaking about the report said that “[b]esides the evident increase in cloud adoption, I think the report also confirms the importance of choosing a multi-cloud strategy for many kinds of organizations. Public, private, and hybrid clouds are all increasing in popularity, which means a company needs to stay flexible in the options that they choose, especially since each model has pros and cons. At PSL, we work with our clients to implement this type of cloud strategy because we consider it a critical part of any digital transformation strategy, and we want our clients to be able to take advantage of the benefits offered by a multi-cloud approach.”

India too will be no stranger to the increasing reliance on cloud computing. Recently, Alibaba Cloud opened its first data centre in Mumbai and Asia Pacific General Manager Alex Li was optimistic of Alibaba´s push to support Indian companies. Speaking to Hindu Business Line, Li said that “we aim to bring our technology expertise and comprehensive cloud offerings to empower Indian enterprises to unlock their business potential…Indian SMEs are at the forefront of leveraging innovative technology more than ever before, to scale and grow their business. We believe that this is the right time to establish our presence in the market.” The news comes hot on the heels of recent news that Alibaba will also bring cloud computing to the Winter Olympics in PyeongChang as well.

Many however, are still sceptical of the switch to cloud-based solutions. The majority of respondents (66%) to the above survey also spoke of security being their number one concern in adopting cloud-based strategies. But others argue that industry heads that choose to watch rather than act risk the chance of being left behind. In an op-ed in Forbes India, Oracle’ Sekar S argued that where older cloud capacities failed, newer ones provide better solutions.   “Now, new migration tools and bare metal based cloud solutions are offering the ability to move an application spread across multi-tier VMware virtualized and physical infrastructure “as-is” to the public cloud – accelerating the enterprise’s progress to cloud and mitigating the long migration efforts that were traditionally needed.” the op-ed noted.

Given the inevitability of cloud computing to cover the simplest tasks online to the most sophisticated industrial operations, it’s likely that companies are likely to sit up and take note of the growing cloud outside their window.