There’s no doubt about it, hybrid clouds are all the rage. In the APAC region alone, the hybrid cloud market is projected to grow at 29.11% CAGR YOY until 2025. As ANZ is one of the most advanced cloud markets in the region, it’s safe to say that a significant percentage of that growth will take place there. 

Why? In times of economic, political, societal, political and environmental uncertainty, organisations must be able to move between public clouds, private clouds and on-premises infrastructure as they see fit. Furthermore, hybrid cloud frameworks tend to be much more cost-effective and scalable than alternative models. 

However, despite its potential, hybrid cloud is not without its disadvantages. It can be difficult to implement, it can be complex to manage and achieving full interoperability remains elusive. With that in mind, here are 5 key ingredients to building a scalable, economical and secure hybrid cloud strategy. 

Want more in-depth guidance on maximising your cloud strategy? Our FREE Hybrid Cloud Innovation & Security virtual event taking place June 8th will offer you a more comprehensive education on how to securely build, manage, and automate a hybrid cloud in a layered, defense-in-depth security strategy. Though designed to address the unique needs of IT practitioners based in Australia and New Zealand, all are invited to attend and partake in the learning. 

Employ a robust cloud migration strategy

As every company has different needs and technology requirements, every company approaches cloud migration in a different way. One popular framework IT leaders use is a process known as rationalization, the process of evaluating workloads to determine the best way to migrate or modernise each asset in the cloud. It involves determining which workloads are cloud-ready and, for those that are not, how to best transform them into being so. 

Want to learn tangible best practises for envisioning and realizing your hybrid cloud strategy? Attend A Successful Journey to Hybrid Cloud presented by Simon Delord - Solution Architect, Red Hat. 

Embrace Hybrid Cloud Management Tools 

Successful migration is only half the battle, managing data flows across multiple infrastructures requires orchestration and ongoing monitoring. Furthermore, though every cloud has its own set of monitoring tools, in order to achieve full end-to-end visibility and control across the entire hybrid cloud ecosystem, you’ll need to implement a single, centralised cloud management system. 

Hybrid cloud management solutions integrate multiple cloud services into one unified platform, enabling the automation of workload provisioning, orchestration and ongoing monitoring. Not only do these solutions boost cost-savings and human productivity, they also help fortify data protections. 

Adopt a Security-First Approach to Cloud

It’s a sad fact of the world that cloud attacks are on the rise. In fact, 79% of companies experienced at least one cloud data breach during the 2020-2021 time period. 

Adopting a security-first approach to hybrid cloud management is critical to protecting your business from the growing threat of cyber attacks. This means that, instead of addressing security issues post-development, security is built into the application development process. 

For more on this, we invite you to attend DevSecOps CICD pipeline with Advanced Cluster Security for Kubernetes integration hosted by Wayne Dovey, Senior Architect, Red Hat.

In addition, leveraging real-time discovery and cloud security tools, organisations can automate the threat identification and mitigation process. Combined with powerful cloud governance and threat response policies, these AI-powered technologies can help organisations dramatically reduce the risk of data breaches and cyber threats. 

Balance Security with Innovation

Agility and security don’t have to be at odds. In fact, many would argue that hybrid cloud offers the best of both worlds. While public and private clouds offer businesses extreme levels of flexibility, for data that is especially sensitive or regulated, on-premise still remains an option. 

However, adopting, optimising and securing  a hybrid cloud infrastructure is only the first step. Cybersecurity, IT and “the business” must work in tandem to ensure everyone across the enterprise capitalises on its potential. 

Of course, doing this is easier said than done. For expert insight on how to successfully balance security with innovation, we invite you to attend this panel discussion on June 8th at 9am AEST:

Harmonising Between Security and Innovation in Public Cloud: Sharing Best Practices featuring:

• Anafrid Bennet - Manager, IT & Security Operations, Greater Western Water, Australia
• Shubha Sridhar - Technology Integration Partner, Greater Western Water
• Reuben Athaide - Head, Cyber Security Advisory and DevSecOps, Standard Chartered Bank

Embrace Compliance and Governance as Strategic Priorities

Organizations can no longer afford to treat compliance and governance as afterthoughts. These concepts must be integrated into your cloud strategy from day one.

By establishing a comprehensive, enterprise-wide framework that defines how end users can best make use of cloud services, cloud governance not only helps organisations maintain regulatory compliance, but maximise ROI, minimise security risk and drive front-line innovation. In addition, by outlining ownership, it helps ensure accountability. 

A significant part of this strategy is also data governance, your framework for regulating the availability, integrity, usage and security of data within the cloud environment. To learn more about how cloud governance and data governance intersect, check out Driving Data Governance Through The Cloud, a fireside chat with Dr. Ian Oppermann - Chief Data Scientist, Customer, Delivery and Transformation, Department of Customer Service, NSW Government.

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER FOR NEW DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION CONTENT EVERY WEEK