What is Hybrid Cloud?
All cloud computing services should offer certain efficiencies to different degrees but public cloud services are likely to be more cost efficient and scalable that private clouds. With hybrid cloud, an organisation can maximise their efficiencies by employing public cloud services for all non-sensitive operations, only relying on a private cloud where they require it, with it ensuring that all platforms are seamlessly integrated.
Examples of how Hybrid Clouds can be used
Hybrid cloud models can be implemented in a number of ways:
- Separate cloud providers team up to provide both private and public services as an integrated service
- Individual cloud providers offer a complete hybrid package
- Organisations who manage their private clouds themselves sign up to a public cloud service, which they then integrate into their infrastructure
In practice, an enterprise could implement hybrid cloud hosting to host their e-commerce website within a private cloud, where it is secure and scalable, but their brochure site in a public cloud, where it is more cost effective (and security is less of a concern).
Alternatively, an Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) offering, for example, could follow the hybrid cloud model and provide a financial business with storage for client data within a private cloud, but then allow collaboration on project planning documents in the public cloud – where they can be accessed by multiple users from a convenient location.
Features
Scalability
Whilst private clouds do offer a certain level of scalability depending on their configurations (whether they are hosted internally or externally for example), public cloud services will offer scalability with fewer boundaries because resource is pulled from the larger cloud infrastructure. By moving as many non-sensitive functions as possible to the public cloud, it allows an organisation to benefit from public cloud scalability whilst reducing the demands on a private cloud
Cost efficiencies
Again, public clouds are likely to offer more significant economies of scale (such as centralised management), and so greater cost efficiencies, than private clouds. Hybrid clouds, therefore, allow organisations to access these savings for as many business functions as possible whilst still keeping sensitive operations secure.
Security
The private cloud element of the hybrid cloud model not only provides the security where it is needed for sensitive operations, but can also satisfy regulatory requirements for data handling and storage where it is applicable
Flexibility
The availability of both secure resource and scalable cost effective public resource can provide organisations with more opportunities to explore different operational avenues
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