2022: The Year of the Cloud?
The COVID lockdowns - completely terrible from our collective individual standpoints - brought about an exciting spell of technological developments, particularly for the Cloud. You only have to cast your mind back to circa 2018, where the phrase 'work from home' was almost an alien concept, Zoom was more of an adjective as opposed to a noun, and badly-angled FaceTime calls with older relatives were as close to a video call as many of us got.
Now, we're living in vastly different times. As IT leaders continue to shift workloads and processes into the Cloud, you may be wondering if this momentum can continue throughout 2022 and beyond.
The Pandemic
You don't need us to talk about how difficult the pandemic was on us all. But, from our own experiences, we noticed a shift in our partners and organisations in a similar space.
If it did nothing else, the pandemic upended how organisations operated and highlighted how many of our working practices left much to be desired. As tech advancements were made, a shift to the Cloud became more and more common. Findings showed that "there was a 200% jump in organisations planning to move more than 75% of their apps/workloads to the Cloud, with 86% of companies placing Cloud options in their decision process for new applications, and more than 40% choosing the Cloud as their first option".
Question marks may remain over how long this boom can continue - and it may partly depend on working habits in the future, costs, or even boosting efficiency in the wake of events such as 'The Great Resignation'.
In short, we may not know what the future of work looks like. But, if we were to take an educated guess, it would involve a greater dependency on the Cloud.
The Year of The Cloud?
As more and more organisations make the switch, we're not expecting the Cloud trend to disappear anytime soon. In fact, 2022 could well become a running theme throughout the year.
But what can you expect from the year ahead? We've outlined some trends to watch out for over the next three quarters of 2022, including:
More organisations are finding partners to help their Cloud journey
An enhanced focus on security
Hybrid Cloud models are becoming even more mainstream
Organisations will continue to increase their Cloud spending
A bigger AI and Cloud computing crossover, reducing costs and increasing efficiency
Shifting to The Cloud
As Forbes wrote, "Businesses migrating to the Cloud traditionally have two options. They can use easily accessible, pay-as-you-go public Cloud solutions or more customised and flexible private cloud solutions".
Therein lies the first challenge of migrating to the Cloud; finding a model that works best for you. Public Cloud solutions can be thought of as offerings like Microsoft Azure or AWS. Microsoft and Amazon own their respective hardware, software - and any other supporting infrastructure - and are responsible if things go wrong.
Private Cloud, on the other hand, is much more exclusive. It can be located on-site, in a data centre or with a third party such as an MSP, but this Cloud option keeps everything on a private network.
Different organisations have different needs, processes, and reasons for moving to the Cloud, and once you're ready, you may wonder what comes next. We'll tell you.
Migrate with the Experts
If you've got this far and have questions about migrating - or where to turn to - you're in luck. At Fifosys, we launched our first-generation Cloud platform in 2007 and have continued down that path ever since.
Recently, we put together a blog that explores more about how to migrate to the Cloud. Here, we summarised some of the benefits that come with it, including:
Increased agility and flexibility
The option of scalability
Reduction in costs
Simplified IT processes
Equally, we've put together blogs that look at the Six Rs of Cloud migration and outlined just some of the lessons we've learned over the last two decades.
The Last Word
As with anything technical, it can seem daunting at first - and can quickly feel like you're climbing a mountain in perilous conditions if you go it alone. The reality is that Cloud migrations can be a complex, tricky and time-consuming process. A botched - or ineffective - migration can become costly and counter-productive and may even present cyber criminals with a route into your network.
But it doesn't have to be doom and gloom. Here at Fifosys, we've had a long-standing association with the Cloud - and we'd love to guide you on your journey. If you feel like your business could benefit from such advantages, what better time to leap into the Cloud? Make 2022 the year you embrace technology.