How to Select a Cloud Computing Technology for Your Startup

According to Equity Master, the software industry in India contributes around 8% to the nation’s GDP.  There are a vast number of factors leading to this rampant growth in the industry. The IT services in India are continuing to move up the value chain with the help of digitization and non-linear growth models. One of the major backbones of this increasing digitization is cloud computing technology.

Today, if we talk about the development of applications, storage of a company’s data or security of a company’s digital infrastructure, the cloud is the first word that comes into everyone’s mind. This is due to the flexibility and reliability offered by the cloud infrastructure.

Earlier, enterprises used to spend an ample amount of time and resources on building dedicated teams to run and maintain their servers. It was even more difficult for startups to build up such resources due to limited capital and funds. However, cloud has made everything simple.

If you are on the verge of choosing a cloud technology for your startup, you might find it difficult to map the best solution for your business needs. It is very crucial to assess various factors before determining the best option for your business requirements.

Let’s look into the various cloud options available for you to choose:

1. Public Cloud: It can be defined as the cloud computing services offered over public internet by third-party cloud vendors which is available to everyone who wants to purchase or use them. These are available as free or paid services and the users are required to pay as per their usage.

The main advantage of using the public cloud is its lesser cost as compared to other cloud services which are beneficial in case of startups who don’t have sufficient resources to purchase and maintain server infrastructure. However, public cloud lags in providing complete security as its public environment is prone to intrusions and attacks.

2. Private Cloud: This type of cloud service is provided either over the internet or through a private network free of internet intrusion and is accessible only to a selected number of users. Private cloud delivers a higher level of security and privacy to its users as compared to a public cloud.

However, private cloud is much expensive as it comes with additional management and maintenance expenses which makes it difficult for a newly established firm to adopt this technology.

3. Hybrid Cloud: You can term hybrid cloud as a mix of both public and private cloud as it allows data and applications to be accessed between them. You can conveniently shift your organization’s workload between the public and private cloud as per your business demands. In other words, you get the flexibility of the public cloud and security of the private cloud by keeping your sensitive data and business-critical applications safe.

Now, as you know the available options, you can easily access your business needs based upon which you can decide the best choice for you. There are some crucial factors you need to determine.

Some of these factors include:

• Data type: The kind of data you are looking to store in the cloud is one of the most significant driving factors in deciding the type of cloud service you require. For instance, if your data contains some sensitive information, you must opt for a private cloud.
• Organization size: The number of people in your organization is the second deciding factor for you. Always go for an option that is feasible for your business and can scale with your growing business needs.
• Budget: You need to consider your budget before going for a particular service as each service comes with its own costs. Make sure its worth the investment.

With these factors in mind, select a service that best suits your needs. Apart from the differentiations mentioned above, the software industry in India is witnessing different abstractions of cloud technology. These are known as IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service) and PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service). These buzzwords refer to the various cloud solutions offered by cloud vendors.

Below is a quick outline of both these solutions:

• IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service)

IaaS refers to your ability as a cloud user to provision processing, storage, networks, and other computing resources and you are able to deploy and run arbitrary software. This software may also include operating systems and applications.

In simpler words, IaaS enables you to programmatically create, manage and use the cloud infrastructure elements that may include network, storage, and computing resources. IaaS can provide you the scalability in further stages of your business expansion. However, the prerequisite for this solution is that yup need at least one developer in your startup with the skill set to understand and work on the system.

• PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service)

PaaS is a proven model for running applications without the hassle of maintaining and managing the on-premise infrastructure. Interestingly, your cloud vendor takes complete care of managing your servers and you get high-level databases, user authentication as well as endpoint access to client-side applications. This approach to the cloud solution is much simpler and you take care of almost all of your essential business applications.

Generally speaking, both these cloud solutions prove to be a great time and money savers as you get to run a server with one-click-use and pay according to your usage.

Conclusion

To sum up, selecting the right cloud computing technology is equally important for startups as it is for an established enterprise. With the advent rise in IT services in India, there are a good number of cloud vendors with different solutions and technologies in the market who offer great services. It is up to you to choose the best one out of them.

The major objective of this article to give you an understanding of the cloud computing technology and how it is imperative to choose the right one for your business. Therefore, you must have got familiar with the differences and the alternatives and hence, make a wise decision.