Serverless computing lets businesses build agile applications that can easily adapt according to a company’s IT demand and needs. Providers of serverless computing offer pay-as-you-go services, and the platform is great for creating and hosting backend systems that handle mini-programs, web apps, containers, orchestration layers, Artificial Intelligence models, as well as various Application Programmer Interfaces (APIs). Serverless computing can act like Backend as a Service (BaaS) platform and serverless providers take care of all system infrastructure management, all operation and maintenance (O&M) needs while giving clients the freedom to build, develop, and deploy systems and applications without having to worry about hardware, software, networking, or data orchestration needs.

Is serverless computing right for your business? Well, that depends. As with everything in business, it’s best to look at the risk-reward ratio as well as the return on investment (ROI) when deciding whether or not to implement new technology. Since the serverless providers have made these platforms quick to set up, simple to scale, and easy to turn on and turn off, serverless is usually a cost-effective way to reduce IT expenses. Serverless computing can also cut down on capital expenditure because, whereas the purchase of new servers can be considered a capital expenditure or a CapEx expense, cloud costs can be treated as operating expenses or an OpEx. The latter is usually treated more favorably as a tax expense, therefore there might not be direct revenue generation but there could be simple bottom-line improvement with a serverless computing implementation when growing an IT estate.

Standard Extract, Transform, Load (ETL) tasks can also be simplified, while time and energy can be saved when an ETL job run encounters data issues, as they often do. Should particular files not be ready for extraction, the system can trigger an alert that informs any necessary department or individual that there are data issues. The ETL run could be put on hold or even shut down until all required data is ready to be imported. Event-based computing even allows developers to write code that updates compute and storage needs on a serverless system, thereby optimizing a workflow.

On the risk side of the ledger, going serverless means giving up a certain element of control over a company’s IT estate. Although, in general, cloud computing environments are highly secure, any company that falls victim to a cyberattack must coordinate all responses through the cloud provider who hosts the serverless environment. Since the actual servers and infrastructure are owned by the cloud provider, they will be the ones leading the cyberattack response and they will be the ones ultimately responsible for getting the attack under control. Also, serverless computing providers often rely on open-source libraries, but this software tends to be less secure than commercial software.

Today, companies as distinctive as Slack, HomeAway, GreenQ, and Coca-Cola are all successfully utilizing serverless computing platforms to handle such divergent things as chatbot applications, real-time traveler recommendation systems, Internet of Things (IoT) systems that collect key metrics from garbage trucks to improve waste management pickup and delivery, as well as payment processing systems to buy a coke.

Serverless computing can give companies more control over their infrastructure spending. It also can reduce operations and maintenance expenses, increase a system’s reliability, and allow instant scalability to ensure customers won’t be frustrated by a lack of access. Above all else, a technology that allows developers time to focus on the one thing they do best – coding – should be embraced and heralded.

Championed as ‘The next big thing in IT Operation’, AIOps uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to collect and perform real-time analysis on a system’s data. This can help system administrators to infer probable root causes for problems, potentially, alleviating them and keeping the system running smoothly and optimally.

Gartner defines AIOps as a platform that utilizes “big data, modern machine learning and other advanced analytics technologies to, directly and indirectly, enhance IT operations (monitoring, automation and service desk) functions with proactive, personal and dynamic insight.” AIOps platforms enable the concurrent use of multiple data sources, data collection methods, analytical (real-time and deep) technologies, and presentation technologies.”

Nothing compares to an experienced engineer who knows the unique quirks and intricate nuances of a company’s IT estate, except maybe AIOps. Man’s superiority as a monitoring device is now being challenged by this real-time monitoring system that can learn and oversee a company’s hardware and network infrastructure, as well as the software running on it, so well that it can proactively advise on problems that are not only occurring but might be about to become problematic. In a predictive asset maintenance kind of way, AIOps can deliver control over chaos. AIOps can manage an IT system on a whole new level, a level that is far beyond the capabilities of man.

Why do you need AIOps? Well, today’s IT systems have become so incredibly complex and many of today’s IT monitoring tools are single-focused diagnostic tools that look only to the past and have no predictive capabilities. AIOps, however, can take in massive amounts of data from a multitude of systems, aggregate the data in real-time, then detect a cause and effect pattern that most humans would miss as well as offer solutions to potential problems before they become too costly or mission-critical.

The benefits of an organization utilizing AIOps are multifold.  First and foremost, a reduction in operational noise, which will help increase performance, and any analytical model more accurate. AIOps will bring organization to normally chaotic IT systems. ML algorithms within an AIOps system can capture data, meta-tag it, classify it, detect anomalies, then predict trends, determine causality, and then potentially heal the system. AIOps workflows can become part of the company’s ongoing system operational intelligence that can help keep problems proactively at bay. IT departments won’t be inundated with microservice alerts. Operations will get detailed information about potential issues that threaten mission-critical services. AIOps allows collaboration throughout the company.

Today, almost any system-level metric can be added as a variable in an AIOps analytical model, which can help build a root-cause analysis of potential issues. Overall, the business will get end-to-end visibility into their critical processes, which should help identify problems that might cause future incidents. One of the biggest benefits of AIOps is it provides insight into future events and therefore mitigates downtime.

Because of the complexity of modern IT systems, cause-and-effect is not always an easy thing to capture and/or correlate. However, AIOps can act as a situation room sitting atop a company’s IT infrastructure, standing at the ready to proactively squash any issue or problem that might arise. AIOps systems can even act in a self-fixing way. All-in-all, AIOps will help companies make better IT decisions. They will become more agile, more productive, more reactive, and their analytical models will be more accurate. It is AIOps to the IT operations rescue, and this probably won’t be the first time AI eclipses man.

In the world of IT, it seems that just about everything is being moved to the cloud. Cloud solutions like AWS, Azure, and many others provide companies with incredible benefits that simply aren’t possible with localized infrastructure. When evaluating whether the cloud is the right place for your business technology it is possible to pick and choose what is migrated, and when. For many companies, the best place to start is migrate your DevOps to the cloud. Cloud based software and app development will offer your organization some great benefits that make it a perfect fit. Take a few minutes to learn about some of the biggest advantages of migrating your DevOps to the cloud today.

Powerful Automation

While automation can be setup and used in any environment, it is natively available on most cloud-based DevOps platforms. For example, you can compile code, create test environments, run load tests on software, and much more automatically in this environment. It is also fast and easy to use automation to perform functions using multiple different configurations, which is a powerful tool for software development. If a developer is working on a web portal for customers, for example, they can automate tests that will use every version of every major web browser to ensure things function properly. Cloud based DevOps automation not only speeds things up, but produces better results as well.

Near Instant Setup of Test Environments

When it is time to test new software, you won’t have to manually access a specific server, manually install the software, and then begin the testing. With DevOps on the cloud, you just select what type of environment you need for testing, and the infrastructure is automatically created in seconds. This will provide you with a dedicated test environment where you can safely run any tests you need. It is even possible to have the cloud infrastructure create a test environment that simulates a production environment, so your testing is as accurate as possible.

Easy Collaboration

Modern software development is almost always a collaborative process. Business apps are often large and complex so it would not make sense to have just one person working on them alone. Cloud technologies are known for making it easy for people from distant geographic locations to access the same systems at the same time. For DevOps, this means you can have your development team working from anywhere that is convenient. Many companies will have some developers in an office, others working from home, and still others on an offshore team. Cloud based DevOps makes this collaboration easy and effective.

Pay for System Resources As You Need them

When developing or testing software, you need to have a platform on which it can run. For on premise DevOps, this means purchasing hardware (often multiple different setups) for these activities to run on. As anyone in IT knows, hardware is expensive and becomes obsolete in only a few years. When DevOps is on the cloud, you can stand up a new system instantly, and only pay for the specific resources you are using. To make it even better, you only have to pay for those resources while you are actually using them. Once you are done with a project or a test, simply stop using them and there will be no more cost. This feature of cloud DevOps alone will often cover any costs associated with a migration.

Rapid Deployment

For many organizations, this will be the biggest reason why software and app development should be migrated to the cloud. Once development has been completed and testing has been finished, the software can be deployed extremely quickly. If the software will be accessed on the cloud itself, the deployment will take just minutes to get it pushed out where it needs to go. Even if the software will be run locally or at an on premise datacenter, however, cloud DevOps makes it easy to push out software and updates anywhere they need to go. Many companies will even take advantage of continuous integration solutions such as Bamboo or Jenkins to handle the deployment automatically.

Make Cloud DevOps a Part of Your Digital Transformation

There is no doubt that cloud technologies will help to improve your overall DevOps strategy. Whether you are already planning on moving your systems to the cloud or not, transitioning your development is a smart move. It will help to speed things up, improve quality, and reduce the overall cost. On top of all of that, this type of migration is something that the developers themselves typically love.

Read more benefits about migrating to the cloud:  Eight Reasons Why Your Business Should be Migrating to the Cloud

1. Cheaper

Cloud computing services are usually charged based on the amount of storage you need, the software you are using, and the number of users you require. So, you only pay for what you use. Hosting your applications on your in-house file servers is much more expensive because you must pay the upfront cost of hardware, and you have the ongoing cost of IT support, regardless of much of the available capacity you use.

2. Scalable

Increasing user numbers or the available storage space on a cloud-based solution is easy to do, and you can usually scale up your usage in small increments. This flexibility makes scaling up a cloud-based solution much more cost-effective and flexible than upgrading in-house software and buying new hardware.

3. Better Security

The data centers that host cloud services have far better security systems in place than a small company could manage. Having your data stored in the cloud also means that you are less at risk from the physical theft of file servers or laptops.

4. Greater Mobility

Cloud-hosted data and apps are accessible from anywhere, so employees can work from home or when they are traveling. Cloud computing also reduces the cost of the relocation of a business. And, it is likely to reduce the total number of workstations needed in the company as well.

5. Easier Collaboration

Cloud computing improves collaboration because it is much easier to share data. Employees will be able to work together on projects regardless of the employee’s physical location. Cloud computing also reduces the duplication of data because all the data is in one central location.

6. Simplified Software Support and Maintenance

The centralized location of apps greatly simplifies software support and maintenance. Support personnel will have direct access to data so they will be able to resolve issues faster. And, software upgrades are applied centrally, so there is no need to update each workstation.

7. Built-in Disaster Recovery

In the event of a disaster, such as a fire at the business premises, cloud computing will allow the business to continue running from another location far quicker than if the company was operating on local computers. The built-in disaster recovery aspect of cloud computing reduces both the disruption to the business in the event of a disaster and the cost of implementing disaster recovery strategies.

8. Easier to Enforce Policies and Compliance

Cloud computing makes the enforcement of company policy and statutory compliance much more manageable. Apps, data, templates, and even folder structures are all easier to control when a business migrates to the cloud.

Conclusion

As you will see from the above points, there are a lot of good reasons to migrate your business to the cloud. Cloud computing reduces costs, it can increase efficiency, and it’s not very difficult to do. You do not need to move your entire operation to the cloud in one go. You can gradually replace old legacy systems with cloud-based systems over time. As you migrate to the cloud, you are likely to find even more business benefits than those listed above.

Personally we are big fans of Amazon Web Services for cloud services.  For Windows based applications we recommend Azure.

Contact us to help you migrate applications to the cloud.

Cloud computing offers numerous advantages for businesses and is an excellent way to reduce costs. Cloud technology allows companies to store large amounts of data in the cloud while making it easy to access this information from nearly anywhere in the world. Cloud computing will continue to make a significant impact on the workplace, and understanding the many advantages of this technology is an excellent way for your company to decrease costs. Here are a few ways that cloud computing can save your business money in today’s workplace.

#1 Scalability Options

Cloud technology is highly scalable, and you will never have to worry about running out of storage space. Instead of manually purchasing new hard drives, you can quickly add more storage space on the cloud at a much more affordable price. Your IT team or a managed service provider can add more storage with a few clicks of a button, and you will only pay for the amount that you use.

#2 Less Overhead Costs

Another way cloud technology can save your company money is that you will have fewer overhead costs. Cloud technology gives your business access to the latest software programs, and you will never have to worry about manually downloading updates. Minimal infrastructure maintenance also allows your IT team to be more efficient and focus on more important issues.

#3 Additional Levels of Security

Cloud computing plays a key role in protecting you from ransomware threats and data loss. All of your data is automatically uploaded on the cloud instead of being stored locally on a computer. All of this information can be accessed at any time, and you will never have to worry about paying expensive fees to regain access to your data due to ransomware and other cyber threats.

#4 Enhance Productivity

Cloud technology is one of the best ways to boost productivity in the workplace due to its ease of access from any location with access to the internet. Employees can work on important projects at home or on a business trip. All of this information is updated in real-time, which makes it easy for employees to collaborate with each other from any location.

#5 Minimal Downtime

Downtime can quickly get expensive and cost your business thousands of dollars in only a few minutes. However, downtime is nearly non-existent in the cloud due to its structure. Many cloud providers boast of a 99% uptime rate while offering real-time information and historical data to back up these claims. The lack of downtime in the cloud allows your employees to work at any time of the day or night without facing any technical issues.

Cloud computing is one of the best investments for any business in today’s work environment. Cloud technology can save your company money in numerous ways and will only continue to make a significant impact in the workplace. The business world is highly competitive, and cloud computing is a great way for your company to save money and become even more successful.