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Enterprises are turning to the cloud for their data and applications. Best of breed functions, ease of access and use, scalability and flexibility are some of the compelling reasons for deploying cloud services.

However, enterprises may also fall into the trap of losing control over their cloud investments. While a multi-cloud strategy allows them to avoid vendor lock-in, it can also create an environment that’s increasingly difficult to manage. There are a surprisingly high number of cost elements to consider when utilising multi-cloud, with connectivity being one of them.

So, what are some of the common challenges experienced by enterprises during their cloud journeys?

What technologies should they implement to ensure they are not overpaying for their cloud connectivity?

Challenges Introduced by Cloud Adoption

As an enterprise considering cloud adoption in some form, it is important to be aware of some of the more challenging aspects of networking which can result in both direct and indirect costs:

1

Security Isn’t Always What it Seems

Each cloud service requires a specific approach to security, so becoming an expert in multiple environments can be challenging. This could potentially result in inconsistent management of security policies, which can put the organisation in compromised positions.
2

Costs Can Ramp Up

Most clouds require businesses to pay to retrieve or push data out, also known as egress charges. At large volumes, these data charges can be significant and difficult to budget for.
3

Crowded Public Gateways

Using the internet to access mission-critical cloud services can get crowded. These public gateways can often experience downtime which is out of an organisation’s control. This results in poor performance and even outages, which are detrimental to the end user experience.

 

A study by Beaming and Opinium found that UK businesses clocked up 149 million hours of internet downtime in a single year, resulting in £12.3 billion in lost productivity. The cost to business in terms of lost productivity and unnecessary overtime amounted to £521 per employee.

4

Complexity

Using cloud connectivity services can be complex, and more so if businesses use more than one cloud service. There is not a lot of consistency of how to manage cloud networking in different providers, which can be difficult for enterprises with skill gaps in their IT teams.
5

Traditional Private Network Design Issues

Traditional WAN design backhauls cloud traffic to the HQ before sending the data to its destination effectively tromboning the traffic. This can become prohibitively expensive as an organisation adds more branch sites and more apps in the cloud.
6

Scalability and Deployment Issues

Traditional networks are too rigid and complex to satisfy growing bandwidth requirements. They are not cloud-ready or able to provide WAN optimisation, which is detrimental to enterprises when trying to scale their operations.

Designing a cloud-ready connectivity strategy can be complex. Done incorrectly may not only result in higher direct costs, but also indirect costs in terms of poor performance, security and agility.

There are plenty of considerations when designing connectivity to and between your cloud deployments. To ensure secure access and performance for your cloud environments, particularly for mission critical functions, you will likely need to consider some form of private cloud connectivity solution.

Utilising an intelligence-driven private cloud network ensures you have both security and performance needed for a successful multi-cloud strategy.

How to Simplify and Avoid Overpaying for Private Cloud Connectivity

To avoid overpaying for network connectivity to the cloud and between clouds in a multi-cloud environment, it’s important for enterprises to consider their strategy closely. Addressing issues such as security, complexity, and even compliance and regulatory governance when using multiple clouds requires a different approach to how enterprises deploy and manage their network.

Enterprises need an intelligent network with multi-cloud capabilities to gain full visibility, security, scalability and simplified management. To address this, they should look for a provider that delivers end-to-end cloud-first connectivity that comes with visibility and control. That includes five key components:

1

Direct connectivity to all the leading cloud providers

The right provider will provide on-demand and direct connections to cloud providers globally, with granularity and last mile access. A direct cloud connect solution allows enterprises to transfer mission-critical data securely, connect to major clouds from one platform, scale bandwidth to meet changing network loads, improve performance and user experience of applications.

It also saves egress and port costs which helps enterprises to maintain cost-efficiency in their cloud strategy.

2

Overlay with application-aware connectivity

A comprehensive solution will include a software-defined wide-area network (SD-WAN) overlay, as well as direct cloud connectivity, to simplify and optimise a complex network of multiple sites and clouds. By using a centrally-managed platform that unifies SD-WAN, security, routing, and WAN optimisation, users can securely and intelligently direct application traffic across the WAN with increased visibility. Thus, delivering a self-driving wide area network that continuously learns and adapts to the changing needs of businesses. Enterprises can retain the traditional MPLS network for mission-critical applications, but Ethernet or even broadband for others to save costs.
3

Truly global connectivity

Enterprises need a provider that can extend their reach on a global scale, even in hard to reach destinations. With global reach from a single provider, enterprises can lower costs by increasing efficiencies and service quality by removing the need to work with multiple providers.
4

The ability to provision on demand

Enterprises should look for a service provider that can provide an orchestration platform to provision and scale on-demand, as well as the ability to monitor and provide application-aware insights. This can help to save costs by providing simple scalability without costly infrastructure upgrades, as well as network intelligence minimising downtime by utilising the best routes.
5

Common networking deployment and policy

Enterprises should ensure they are able to deploy a network solution with common policies and management capabilities that fit across and integrate into all clouds as well as their own sites and user communities. This reduces expensive risks, whilst also eliminating the costly need to maintain multiple cloud network configurations that are all completely different.

Moving Forward with Intelligence

Intelligent WAN solutions allow today’s geographically dispersed enterprises to realise the transformation promise of cloud computing, lowering capital and operational costs and providing performance increases without sacrificing security.

The right solution enables enterprises to maximise the value of their cloud and digital investments with a modern WAN architecture. To learn more about maximising your network efficiency with a comprehensive intelligent WAN solution, speak to a Multi-cloud Expert today.

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