For firms to stay competitive, digital transformation has made using new technology necessary. Rising client demands and shifting market conditions in India, particularly the Covid-19 pandemic, have hastened the need for businesses to modernize quickly. According to IDC research, 46% of business products and services would, in fact, be sold online by 2022. Organizations are accelerating the digitization process in order to achieve these aims. One of these strategies is a complete switch to the cloud, which paves the way for the next breakthroughs.

About 40% of Indian companies will implement dedicated cloud services either on-premise or through a service vendor by 2024. This will be executed in response to the performance, security, and compliance requirements, another IDC report highlighted.

Why are cloud resources being underutilized?

Although the cloud’s future in India appears bright, most businesses that intend to move workloads and apps there lack two key components: cost efficiency and effective resource management. Data illustrates firms may have lost $17.6 billion in 2020 due to unused resources and overbuilt infrastructure.

The $17.6 billion wastage figure can possibly be due to the following reasons:

• Customers mass-migrate their existing workloads to the cloud without properly scaling the infrastructure.
• inadequate staff training
• Using the incorrect data migration tools
• There is no effective data recovery plan in place. As a result, the same old on-prem methods are used, wasting a tonne of memory and processing power.

Implementing New Cloud Approach For Business in 2022

Acknowledge the communication gap

Traditional SMBs hire fewer employees than other business sectors, so their technology management teams are smaller or nonexistent. Thus, these SMBs have the additional challenge of having less technical and cloud service experience.

Additionally, SaaS, PaaS, and cloud technologies are often relatively less used by regular SMBs. However, nothing to worry about. It would be best if you first recognized that you need professional assistance. Since being a small-medium-sized firm, you won’t be considered cloud-native. Therefore, in order to correctly employ cloud resources without overprovisioning, underutilizing, or spending more than necessary, you need to follow the guidance.

To improve your company’s cloud vision, follow the next steps mentioned.

Choose according to the size of your business

The adaptability and effectiveness of cloud storage make it an obvious choice for small businesses. But how can you pick the finest cloud storage option and the plan that’s perfect for you? 

• Determine your company’s requirements in detail before selecting a cloud storage provider
• Evaluate storage restrictions 
• Verify if the solution supports mobile and external hard drives if your company relies on them
• Think about security
• Compare suppliers

Don’t pinch your pocket

According to a Gartner survey, 80% of companies globally overspent their cloud infrastructure expenditures in 2020 due to a lack of a plan for maximizing cloud utilization.

Surely, you would not want to be one of those companies that overpaid for underutilized resources. To avoid a blow to your budget, follow simple tips:

• Maintain cost hygiene by analyzing your cloud bills.
• Use a cost management tool.
• Utilize public discounting channels, such as AWS savings schemes, to secure discounts.
• Locating wasteful resources and eliminating them, mostly by turning them off or putting them on hold, ideally by automation.
• Execute autoscaling with some careful parameter tweaking.

Hire employees with appropriate skill sets

Cloud engineers carry out the technical tasks related to cloud computing. Smaller businesses could suffice for a single generalist cloud engineer. The engineer has to have worked with at least one of the leading cloud service providers, such as AWS. Other prerequisites include:

• Minimum three years of expertise in architecting, creating, developing, and deploying cloud solutions on AWS platforms.
• Awareness of and familiarity with the five components of a well-designed framework 
• A track record of working collaboratively with cross-disciplinary teams that include business analysts, developers, data scientists, and subject matter experts.
• A variety of the following skills: database architecture, ETL, business intelligence, big data, machine learning, and advanced analytics.

Train existing workforce

Along with rapidly increasing demand, a severe shortage of certified cloud knowledge limits the creative abilities required to carry out digital transformation initiatives. According to Wakefield Research, 94% of IT stakeholders have trouble using the cloud. According to the research, the majority of respondents consider a skills shortage to be a major issue. Because of this, most companies frequently fall short of their cloud adoption goals.

For workers to work effectively in a cloud environment, businesses must make the effort to provide the appropriate training, guidance, and tools. In addition to learning the technical aspects, IT professionals must also learn how to connect with various suppliers and logistical companies.

Pick a cloud type that goes with your business needs

The public cloud is the best option for SMBs because of its low cost, scalability, and flexibility. Depending on business requirements and financial constraints, SMBs can request adjustments to the processing power, storage, and user account settings at any time.

Besides, you get the advantage of an external or third-party cloud provider managing your public cloud platform. The infrastructure, software, and hardware of the provider are all managed by the provider alone, while other businesses may access it. A number of clients’ business demands can be met with high-performing solutions thanks to this configuration.

Private cloud deployment is more expensive than using the public cloud architecture. In fact, some are even free.

Prioritize data management

Data management needs to be a major concern for success. Data is difficult to relocate; thus, planning is necessary. For instance, cloud transit costs restrict your data inside the cloud. Moving data between on-premises and cloud locations can also be time-intensive and costly. Moreover, not all on-premises storage is functional with the cloud and may need complicated interfaces or gateways.

SMBs can start a project that will yield immediate returns. Data protection is an excellent place to start with the cloud: use the cloud as an offsite data archive while keeping the main backup copy on-prem for speedy restoration. This is really economical. Cloud storage with limited access is an option, and access and exit costs are only due to a major problem.

Prioritize security

Security lapses that directly impact all of a cloud service provider’s clients are uncommon. However, using cloud services securely may be challenging, and users sometimes lack the necessary knowledge. Some of the dangers are insecure APIs, account takeover, incorrect setups, and insider threats. Protecting mission-critical information assets, apps, and systems requires maintaining a strong cloud security posture as more enterprises migrate to the cloud.