Hybrid vs Multi-Cloud: Choosing the right approach for your business
Cloud computing has become vital for modern work environments, offering scalability, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness. However, not all cloud technologies are the same. Depending on your business needs and goals, you can adopt various cloud strategies to optimise performance and security.
Two common cloud approaches include hybrid and multi-cloud. Hybrid cloud computing combines public with private cloud or on-premise infrastructures. Multi-cloud doesn’t rely on a single provider, but rather multiple public cloud services from different providers.
Which option best suits your business needs? Continue reading as we explore the differences between hybrid and multi-cloud strategies.
Exploring hybrid and multi-cloud computing
Hybrid cloud computing
As mentioned, the hybrid cloud combines two elements: public and private. A public cloud service is what multiple customers use, such as AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud. A private cloud service is for only one customer, either hosted by themselves or a third-party vendor. An on-premise infrastructure includes any IT infrastructure within a corporate network, like a data centre or server.
Hybrid cloud lets you leverage the best of both worlds: the scalability and flexibility of public cloud computing, and the control and security of private cloud or on-premise infrastructure.
For example, you may store sensitive data in a private cloud or on-premise data centre while using public cloud services for processing, analytics, or application development.
Multi-cloud computing
A multi-cloud leverages the unique strengths of different cloud platforms, giving you greater flexibility, resilience, and cost-effectiveness. For example, you may use one public cloud as a database, another as a platform-as-a-service (PaaS), and another for user authentication.
What’s the difference?
While hybrid integrates on-premise and cloud resources, multi-cloud focuses more on diversity across multiple cloud platforms, emphasising the importance of strategic planning and interoperability for an efficient and resilient infrastructure.
In addition, a multi-cloud:
- Only involves public clouds, while hybrid includes both public and private clouds or on-premise infrastructure.
- It doesn’t necessarily integrate the different cloud services like hybrid.
- Can be considered a mix-and-match approach, while hybrid is more coordinated and unified.
How do you choose between the two?
Selection depends on various factors, including business objectives, technical requirements, budget, and risk tolerance.
Consider these questions before deciding:
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What are my main goals for cloud integration? Is it to improve performance, scalability, agility, innovation, or to achieve other specific outcomes?
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What are the technical requirements? What types of workloads, applications, data, and services need support?
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What are the budget constraints? How much can I invest in cloud infrastructure, maintenance, and security?
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What are the risk factors? How sensitive is the data, and how critical is availability and reliability?
Is hybrid cloud the right choice for your business?
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A hybrid cloud is suitable for your business if you have high security and compliance needs for your data and processes.
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Legacy systems often pose challenges for migration to the cloud due to complexities or costs associated with the process.
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Hybrid cloud solutions offer greater control and customisation over your cloud infrastructure, allowing you to tailor your setup to meet your specific requirements.
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Hybrid cloud environments can optimise your cloud performance and efficiency, ensuring your resources are utilised effectively across your infrastructure.
Is multi-could the right choice for your business?
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Multi-cloud is the optimal choice for businesses with diverse and dynamic needs across various cloud services and features.
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It avoids vendor lock-in and offers flexibility and choice in selecting cloud services tailored to specific requirements.
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By distributing workloads across multiple cloud platforms, businesses can optimize resource utilization and reduce costs by leveraging the most cost-effective solutions for each task.
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A multi-cloud setup inherently enhances resilience and redundancy, ensuring uninterrupted operations even in the face of disruptions or outages from a single provider.
How to evaluate your cloud goals
Step 1: Conduct a cloud readiness assessment
Analyse your current IT environment, business objectives, and cloud requirements, and identify the gaps and opportunities for cloud integration and migration.
Step 2: Define your cloud strategy
Create a document outlining your vision, mission, and goals for cloud computing, and how you plan to achieve them. Include your cloud architecture, service model, deployment model, migration plan, governance model, and budget.
Step 3: Choose the right partner
Evaluate and compare different cloud providers, platforms, and services, and choose one that best suits what you’ve discovered in steps one and two. Remember to consider the features, functionality, performance, reliability, security, compliance, pricing, and support.
Hybrid and multi-cloud are popular cloud strategies that can significantly benefit your business. However, they also have advantages and disadvantages, which is why careful planning and management are critical to ensure optimal performance and security.
To determine which cloud strategy aligns best with your business goals and requirements, it's crucial to carefully assess the factors and ask the right questions. By doing so, you can make informed decisions that drive efficiency and innovation while mitigating potential risks.
If you are interested in further exploring cloud options and gaining deeper insights into cloud computing, we recommend diving into the following informative articles: