Private Cloud - The Next Step in Virtualization

Many organizations who are not in the IT business are looking to move away from the operational and cost complexity of owning, operating and maintaining premises-built datacenters. The reasons for this are numerous. In summary the risk posture facing an organization with a single premises datacenter, combined with the management, cost and compliance overhead, presents a model that is either unsustainable or impractical for many organizations.

PrivateCloud environments provides these organizations with a robust, enterprise-grade virtual datacenter environment that offers a broad spectrum of services in a "utility" based consumption model (e.g. you use what you need, and pay for only what you use).

No two organizations are alike: this carries through to IT services requirements.

PrivateCloud environment addresses these diverse organization needs by offering at least three primary service platforms, I have highlighted my three favorites below for you.

PrivateCloud, Virtual Private Data Center

PrivateCloud, Bare Metal

PrivateCloud Dedicated vCloud

Through these models, PrivateCloud is able to address the needs of SMB and Enterprise organizations in whatever manner is required. Additionally, clients are able to mix provisioning options in order to maximize cost to benefit ratios.

PrivateCloud Data Centers

One of the fundamental reasons organizations are looking to outsource their datacenter environments is the ability to assign risk to a third party. Risks to an organization present in multiple examples, but essentially there are several key risk components:

1. Single Point of Failure. Many SMB organizations are unable to afford to properly provision the levels of redundancy the business would prefer; or provide appropriate geographically-disparate service replication in the event of a situation affecting the region (e.g. weather).

2. Physical and Logical Security. While organizations believe their environments to be secure, in reality many do not have the multi-layer physical or logical security necessary to fully protect their environments. This is simply due to a factor of cost vs. anticipated risk.

3. Compliance. A component of the second risk factor, compliance as it pertains to IT essentially resolves to both controls and audit capability. Along with insufficient security, detailed management and audit controls are often not present in premises environments - especially at a data center level.

Obviously, by assigning risk to a third party, an organization is able to reduce the cost and complexity of risk management. However, this strategy is only viable if the organization to whom those risks are being assigned can provide the appropriate level of management, oversight and service delivery. A true PrivateCloud environment provides a network of TIA 942-certified Tier-4 data center facilities in which your environment is housed. These facilities meet or exceed industry requirements and commonly-recognized best practices.

By providing this level of resiliency, control and management, organizations can rest assured that their application services are being delivered in a manner they expect with the absolute minimum chance for interruption or downtime.

Private Cloud Enhancements - Managed IT services

Now you're in the Cloud; services are operating effectively and you're able to realize the benefits of improved agility, continuity and utility-based computing. BUT, are you're still managing your environment? In a fully managed Private Cloud with "Managed IT" services, a CSP will offer clients proactive problem resolution, 24/7, and they will do everything from restarting services to maintaining OS level operation and support. The net result: your employees benefit from expert, round-the-clock IT service on every level while you avoid the cost and complexity of in-house delivery.

But out-of-sight does not mean out-of-mind. You can be on top of everything anywhere you have access to a browser - desktop, tablet or smartphone and you would still use your applications as you do today!

So take the time to realize the actual benefits of a Private Cloud solution as it will benefit your company in ways that were previously only available to the Fortune 100.

Author:

Jeff Keane

(M) 856-304-5258

(O) 856-628-8398

(Twitter) @HostedVoIPandUC

Jeff has been in the telecommunications, IT and Cloud industries for 17 years and is an industry leader and published expert in his field. Please feel free to reach out to Jeff with any questions at any time.


 By Jeffrey M Keane


Article Source: Private Cloud - The Next Step in Virtualization