The Cloud computing industry may not be the oldest, but it is for sure the fastest growing as more than 90% of the corporations leverage cloud services one way or another. In this day and age, every organization craves a centralized system with robust security, and cloud computing is considered the epitome of such a structure.
Cloud computing is not just merely a data storage service over the internet - it is more. It covers a wide range of services, from storage, networking, artificial intelligence to principal office applications. This adoption of different tasks has emerged a service-oriented approach that was lacking before cloud computing.
As the experts indicate, the world is moving towards the adaptation of cloud computing services so, it is only fair to learn about the upcoming new cloud technologies and trends. We shall now look into what's next in the ever-evolving cloud computing industry and cover the most crucial trends of today and the future.
Eco-Friendly
In recent times where pollution and global warming seem to take the world by storm, big corporations take measures for a better environment. A recent study shows that consumers value the initiative the companies take for the sake of the ecosystem, and people also tend to discard the organizations that violate moral values.
Besides having technological and business advantages, cloud computing serves environmental sustainability. A study conducted by WSP-USA with Microsoft says that with cloud computing, carbon emissions are lowered down to 98% as compared to on-site data centers and is 93% energy-efficient.
Migrating resources to cloud servers is an efficient way of saving the planet earth. It is beneficial for other personal interests of the company, such as the reduction of the price for extra space required for data resources infrastructure. It is one of the key trends and is probably here to stay for a long time.
Edge Computing
As discussed above, the world is moving towards connected devices. But the issue with the latest cloud technology is that the data is in abundance that causes obvious drawbacks like latency problems, decrease in bandwidth, lack of security. Advanced technologies like affective computing, semantic search, and robotics require fast processing, which can be inexpedient with centralized data processing and storage.
The optimal solution is edge computing. In simple terms, edge computing is topology-based, closer to sources form of distributed computing, ultimately linked to cloud servers that increase bandwidth, secure connection and solve the latency problem. It is safe to say that with connecting devices and IoT advancing, manipulation and usage of big data is increasing, edge computing will be instrumental in managing these technologies.
Hybrid Cloud
Hybrid cloud computing is a combination of two different environments of cloud computing; public cloud and private cloud or private on-premises infrastructure. The main difference between multi-cloud and hybrid cloud is the kind of approach they take on cloud infrastructure.
Hybrid cloud focuses on balancing workload across the different environments by shifting the resources related to office emails, online applications, storage, and development to the public cloud. The data with high-security concerns or services exclusive to an organization are on the private cloud or on-site premise infrastructure.
A well-strategized hybrid environment gives the best of both worlds. With its gaining popularity, most corporations are upgrading their system to hybrid cloud technologies, with the hybrid industry expects to boost its valuation from $44.6 billion in 2018 to almost $100 billion in 2023.
Cloud Computing Security
In recent times, remote work has become a norm, which has increased the usage of cloud computing services while also giving rise to cyber security issues. According to a report, cybercrime increased by 630% from January to April in 2020. Experts suggest that the biggest obstacle for most organizations to adapt to cloud computing services is the risk of exploitation to cyber security issues. Companies realize that even though the benefits of switching to cloud technology are inevitable and substantial for their growth, but also understand that if the security aspect is not taken care of, it will be an area of deep concern for them.
In response to these threats, a cloud access security broker (CASB) is software used to tackle the frequent issues faced by the system. CASBs fulfill their job by providing transparency and control over the data by preventing possible cyber-attacks faced by the network by governing standard security protocols.
Even after the availability of such services, half of the companies are still vulnerable to such attacks by not installing the appropriate security management systems for their cloud applications.
Containerization
Unlike traditional virtual machines (VMs), containerization is the new, faster, efficient way of running an application. The way containerization works are that it wraps the software code along with the essential operating system dependencies and libraries to make the code runnable in a lightweight unit, known as a container.
One of the distinctive benefits of containerization is that bringing every component together ensures the app's quick deployment and reliability on multiple computing platforms. Whereas in the conventional method, code is written in one computing environment, so when transferred to another location, it may end up crashing with numerous bugs and errors due to the usage of the hypervisor.
Cloud service providers offer container applications as part of their services. These applications are easily deployed over the top of a cloud application layer by DevOps. Since each application is packaged distinctly in a standardized form of configuration, it assures a safer product with better scalability and a cutback in load time.
Containerization is a more efficient alternative to virtual machines and has eased the burden of many organizations when it comes to complex deployment and operational obstacles of hybrid cloud computing.
A rise is predicted in the usage of containerization technology by the big corporations up to 70% in the year 2023, with at least two container applications in production, where it was just less than 20% back in 2019.
Conclusion
Cloud computing is establishing its reign in the digital world, and the whole world is adapting to it. Companies realize now that this technology is more than just a storage solution. With a better understanding of such trends, organizations can have a more reinforced system with improved cyber security, a wide range of accessibility, and enhanced data management that will provide a lead over its competition. So, ride the new technological advancement wave and leverage these trends to explore new possibilities for your businesses. The cloud is the limit!
