5 Reasons Why You Need The Private Cloud

There's no denying that business and IT executives are under pressure to assist their companies in going digital. Agility needs to increase, but it's no secret that legacy IT models simply can't meet the needs of today's fast-paced, constantly changing business environments. This is one reason why organizations have been embracing the cloud faster than ever.

But sometimes, especially for medium-sized and big businesses, the public cloud model isn't the greatest option.

I recently ran across a post by network switching software provider Cumulus Networks on the private versus public cloud debate, and I thought I would weigh in with my opinion. The first point I want to make is that not everything is going to be in public clouds, despite the media hype. My most recent cloud forecast shows that by 2021 only 35% of all workloads will be in public clouds. Of the remainder, 24% will be in private clouds and the rest will continue running on legacy, on-premises infrastructure.

Most workloads that are classified as conventional on-premises originate from legacy systems that are in need of infrastructure flexibility or agility today. Platforms for collaboration and communications are moving entirely to public or private clouds and will do so in the future. Medium-sized businesses will probably use a hosting provider, but large corporations will probably set up the private cloud infrastructure in their own data centers. Both are workable solutions.

Getting started with private clouds is undoubtedly more effort than just pulling out a credit card and registering with Amazon Web Services (AWS). However, private clouds do offer a superior solution for some organisations with particular needs. For instance, collaborative apps must be extremely elastic in particular organisations.

Think about Web conferences, where the typical attendance is typically in the low hundreds. However, every quarter, a corporation has an all-hands meeting, requiring a rapid capacity expansion into the thousands. Then, employing a private cloud instead of a public cloud service can end up being more economical.

Private Cloud: What Is It?

In very simple terms, the private cloud is dedicated to your company alone. Unlike a public cloud, the private variation is hosted within the company. This means that the servers are not controlled by any provider. More importantly, they are set-up within your company, using your own equipment, and managed by your own team of IT experts.

5 reasons why an organization should consider a private cloud:

1. Dedicated hardware means increased security.

Similar to a colocated or dedicated server, the security of your private cloud is contingent upon several things. However, you may be certain that your data is as safe as if it were right next to your desk provided you have the necessary firewall rules, anti-virus software, and physical protection in place. With a private cloud, you know where your servers are located and that the proper physical and network security is in place. You can meet and talk to those in charge of providing support for your hardware and come visit it if you like.

2. Greater flexibility results from switching to virtual servers from physical ones.

This is one of the most alluring benefits of cloud computing. The ability to spin up and tear down a server in a matter of minutes is incredibly powerful and useful. Creating a server on the fly eliminates the needless work of trying to size one beforehand. Do you require additional disc space? More RAM? More Processor Power? Not an issue. You may quickly reallocate resources using private cloud computing, eliminating the need to search for a physical server with the capacity your new server requires.

3. Fully utilize your hardware with better resource management.

The value of your physical server hardware is greatly increased by virtualization. You may virtualize the five servers on one physical server and share the resources, as opposed to having five servers with an average CPU utilisation of 10% each. This is easier to maintain and uses less electricity and rack space. Additionally, since your servers have been virtualized, you may easily make duplicates of them and get them up and running. An incredibly effective and powerful technique to manage your servers is to have the right resource management tools installed on your server. This will allow you to automatically assign the right resources to a server when it needs them or shut down underutilised servers when they are not in use.

4. Virtual servers combined with a SAN allow for improved protection against disasters.

Amazing redundancy may be attained when a SAN is connected to your private cloud. In a N+1 environment—having at least one additional server than strictly necessary—you can not only load balance across servers, automatically transferring server resources between servers on the fly, but you can also shut down one server without incurring downtime. Imagine being able to undertake server maintenance, such as upgrading software, replacing a hard drive, or adding extra RAM, without any downtime.

When configured correctly you could power off one server and it would automatically shift the virtual servers over to an available server in your cloud. By having a second SAN in a different data centre and using SAN to SAN replication, you may increase the amount of disaster protection you have and create a hot site DR environment that can fully recover in less than an hour.

5. Making the move to private cloud computing will result in time and cost savings.

The nicest thing about a private cloud is that, in addition to all of the wonderful advantages of virtualization and security, it may be less expensive and troublesome than purchasing dedicated servers or hosting your own servers. Your organisation could profit from virtualization if it operates more than two servers. Private cloud computing with a dedicated SAN and numerous physical host servers might be advantageous for your organisation if it has more than ten servers. While the public cloud completely transformed information technology, the private cloud offers widespread advantages.

6. Option to migrate to a hybrid environment 

Realistically, most organizations are going to shift to a hybrid cloud model over time. My research shows that more than 80% of companies intend to go hybrid. Companies that opt for a private cloud always have the option to connect to a public cloud. It could be less difficult to transition from private to hybrid than it is to go from public to hybrid. Once the private cloud is built, the company can choose a public cloud service that interoperates with the private cloud "stack." Choosing the public cloud first may limit infrastructure choices.

Conclusion: Save Money, Save Time, Sleep Easy: Transition to Private Cloud Computing.

It could be less difficult to transition from private to hybrid than it is to go from public to hybrid.These 5 reasons demonstrate why moving to private cloud computing preserves the security and dependability of a typical dedicated server, in addition to offering some amazing advantages of virtualization and pooled computing resources. While not everyone is a good fit for the private cloud, a managed data centre operator can help you realise all of the amazing advantages of the private cloud and make the switch to private cloud computing more affordable.