Cloud Computing Essentials - Part 2 (Cloud Deployment Models)

*** Note: The following statements are for information purposes only. ***

Greetings everyone. In my previous article, I discussed the technical and business definitions of cloud computing. I explained the technical characteristics that define cloud computing and its inherent business benefits. Now that we have a solid foundation and understanding of what cloud computing is, let us take a look at the "who". Who provides cloud computing solutions?

Technically, there are four types of cloud deployment models: Public, Private, Hybrid, and Community. Community clouds are often overlooked nowadays as public cloud providers can currently fulfill the unique requirements of community clouds. Nonetheless, there is a great example of community clouds that have exploded in recent years -- government clouds.

Acronym to remember: CSP -> Cloud Service Provider

1. Public Cloud: Characterized by providing computing services over the internet. The CSP is a third party. Currently, the top three public CSPs are publicly traded companies: Amazon (AWS), Microsoft (Azure), Google/Alphabet (GCP - Google Cloud Platform). Services are available to anyone on a pay-per-usage model, and may be offered for free (often for a limited time, or with strict limitations).
2. Private Cloud: Identified by providing computing services to a select group of users as opposed to the general public. Private cloud computing may be offered over the internet, or an internal private network. Private clouds give businesses similar value to that of public clouds, but offer additional control and adaptability due to complete ownership of the underlying infrastructure.
3. Hybrid Cloud: A combination of a public cloud and a private cloud. It is recommended to have a dedicated, high-bandwidth/low-latency connection (Ex. Azure Express Route or AWS Direct Connect) between both sites for seamless sharing of data and applications. Hybrid clouds are most applicable to businesses or organizations that want to keep business-critical applications and highly-sensitive data on-premises (private cloud). The public cloud comes into play when burstable performance is required for aforementioned items, and for hosting non-critical applications with less-sensitive data.
4. Community Cloud: A shared cloud computing environment that is specific to a community or a group of individuals within a community. Participating individuals or organizations have common interests or requirements in security, compliance, privacy, industry, etc. As mentioned in the beginning of this article, government clouds are a perfect example of community clouds. Both AWS and Azure have dedicated data centers and/or regions whose sole purpose is to serve cloud resources to U.S. government agencies or their partners.

Different use cases exist for cloud deployment models -- each with its own benefits and drawbacks. A real-world scenario for each cloud deployment model is listed below.

• A small software company with limited capital would greatly benefit from using a public cloud provider with its pay-as-you-go pricing model. Thus, shifting all infrastructure costs to operational expenditures. However, said company may become reliant upon native services offered by its chosen CSP, and it may fall victim to cloud vendor lock-in.
• A large corporation recently made a substantial capital investment in upgrading its core data center. With the availability of additional compute hardware, faster storage services, and lower network latency, this corporation is ripe for provisioning a private cloud. Unfortunately, their internal IT staff lacks experience managing cloud environments. Thus, three options are available: properly train existing staff on cloud architecture and engineering concepts, hire additional IT staff with the required knowledge, or partner with a consulting firm that specializes in deploying private clouds.
• A law firm focusing on bankruptcy law is experiencing dynamic client growth. In order to meet its growing client's needs, said law firm must leverage the power of cloud computing to satisfy its technological requirements (metric driven vertical and horizontal scaling up/down and in/out). Although a public cloud would allow for the quickest deployment method, this law firm must keep its highly-confidential data on-premise. Therefore, a hybrid cloud is the best option for this scenario.
• Bill, the owner of a large restaurant chain, wants to reduce operating expenses for his company. The finance department believes the company can increase profit margins by cutting IT costs -- reducing capital expenditure on internal data centers, and exploring cloud computing options. Bill approaches another restaurant chain owner, Wendy, and asks her whether she would consider increasing profit margins by reducing IT expenses. Since Bill and Wendy both operate in the same industry and must both adhere to PCI compliance for processing credit cards, a community cloud is the best fit for their scenario. Furthermore, with each additional entity that joins Bill's and Wendy's community cloud, their profit margins can continue to increase by further spreading out the cost among new users.

I hope you enjoyed this article, and feel that you added another tool to your cloud toolbox. In my next Cloud Computing Essentials article, I will explore the three cloud service models: IAAS, PAAS, and SAAS.

-- Joseph Kupiec over and out until next time...