As the novel coronavirus spread around the world and made in-person work, schooling, shopping and other activities hazardous, one technology emerged as a lifeline to keep us connected and enable vital processes to continue despite social distancing: cloud computing.
Without the cloud, businesses wouldn’t have been able to quickly transition to remote work arrangements. It allowed organizations across various industries to adapt their processes and business models to the “new normal” at a rapid pace, according to Forrester Research. For example, Lowe’s managed to launch a curbside pickup app in only three days.
Last year was a “proof point” for the cloud, John-David Lovelock, distinguished research vice president at Gartner, said in a press release. Its scalability and accessibility made it an ideal tool for remote work and virtual learning during the pandemic.
“This proof point will allow for accelerated penetration of cloud through 2022,” Lovelock said.
As we look forward to the rest of 2021, there’s no doubt that cloud-based solutions and services will continue to play an important role in our lives. If you’re wondering what the next year or so has in store for this significant technology, these are some of the top cloud computing trends to watch, according to various experts and researchers.
1. The cloud will maintain its popularity as we recover from the pandemic.
As we continue to endure the COVID-19 pandemic this year and look forward to our recovery from the public health crisis, cloud computing technology will likely remain a vital part of our daily lives. Even after we get the spread of the coronavirus under control, many businesses have indicated an interest in maintaining hybrid office models, according to the BBC article “Why the future of work might be ‘hybrid.’” In fact, 55 percent of American employees surveyed in May 2020 expressed a preference for a mix of on-site and remote work, according to the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research.
As digital transformation and customer experience (CX) become increasingly vital for success in the business world, companies of all sizes and across all industries will continue to invest heavily in cloud solutions like Unified Communications as a Service (UCaaS), Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS) and the Microsoft Office 365 suite. Overall, the global pubic cloud infrastructure market is projected to grow 35 percent and reach $120 billion this year, according to Forrester.
2. Serverless computing will become more prevalent.
This year, more companies will probably make the switch to serverless computing, according to the CRN article “10 Future Cloud Computing Trends To Watch In 2021.” Serverless computing essentially involves handing off all hardware-related responsibilities to a cloud provider, allowing your organization to run and build apps without worrying about infrastructure management, as “The CIO’s Guide to Serverless Computing” from Gartner explains.
A growing number of companies are going serverless due to the many advantages the approach offers, such as savings from lower infrastructure-related spending. To learn more, check out this previous blog entry: “Reach New Heights in 2021 by Going Serverless and Focusing on Security.”
3. Cloud-based security – i.e., the secure access service edge (SASE) model – will gain traction.
SASE is another notable cloud trend to watch, according to CRN. This cybersecurity concept combines SD-WAN functionality with cloud-native security features to meet the needs of organizations that increasingly depend on cloud platforms, Cisco states.
SASE solutions make plenty of sense for businesses seeking to ensure secure access for remote and mobile end users. We recently published this blog entry on SASE if you’d like to learn more: “Secure Access Service Edge FAQ: The Benefits of SASE for Your Business.”
4. On-premises disaster recovery solutions will decline in favor of cloud-delivered solutions.
The pandemic drove home the importance of resiliency and safeguarding workloads located in public clouds. Subsequently, an additional 20 percent of enterprises are expected to migrate their disaster recovery processes to the cloud in 2021, according to the Forrester blog post “Predictions 2021: Cloud Computing Powers Pandemic Recovery.”
Downtime can come with a high price tag, hurt productivity and drive away clients. For more information on how to make sure your business stays up in running, check out our business continuity and Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS) page.
If you’d like to learn more about these top cloud computing trends and the many cloud-delivered solutions available, don’t hesitate to reach out to our team of cloud consultants. We have experience working with hundreds of cloud solutions from top suppliers in our extensive partner network and can quickly produce comparison matrices showing how your options stack up against each other.
For more information about cloud computing and what migrating to the cloud can do for your business, give us a call at 877-599-3999 or email sales@stratospherenetworks.com.
