Private Cloud vs Public Cloud vs Hybrid Cloud — Which is best?
Advantages and Limitations of Cloud Platforms. When to choose what?
Cloud computing is the latest technology that is rapidly adopted by organizations to reduce their hardware and resources cost and enhance performance over the cloud infrastructure. There are different types of classifications, types and architectures in the cloud world. As per Forbes, almost 83% of the enterprise infrastructure, small to large, will be on cloud by 2022. If the cloud computing platforms need to be categorized then it can be segregated in three different types of models, namely:
- Public Cloud Platform
- Private Cloud Platform
- Hybrid Cloud Platform
Further on the above mentioned cloud platforms, there are different deployment models which can be categorized as Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS) and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). The infrastructure architecture of these deployment models can take different forms and offer a variety of features including virtualization, hyper converged models and much more. If you want to learn more about SaaS, PaaS and IaaS then you can refer our blog Why and What about cloud computing platforms?
Difference between the Cloud Platforms Vs On-Premise
In this post, we will explore the differences, advantages and limitations between varied cloud computing environments.
Public Cloud Platform
If you search online, you will find a lot of posts regarding Public Cloud and common names like Amazon Web Services (AWS), Azure and Google Cloud Platform (GCP). These are the public cloud platform service providers offering cloud space and infrastructure at monthly rentals. Some public cloud services are free while some are subscription based. Different types of services are provided on cloud including email, apps, storage, etc.
Depending on the business requirements different companies use cloud platforms for variety of use. Some companies host their custom software over cloud and offer subscription based access to subscribers while some companies use cloud for testing their applications or software. It completely depends on the business and their futuristic view to utilize the platform as per their need.
The best thing about public cloud is the vendor has to ensure the maintenance and upgrade of the infrastructure on cloud. There will be multiple tenants on single cloud platform and ensuring the space is appropriately provided to all the tenants as per their requirements is the responsibility of the vendor. Scalability, reliability, elasticity and security are the features of the public cloud platforms.
Several large brands across the globe have adopted public cloud platforms. The reason why public cloud platforms are more popular compared is because of the no maintenance and hassle free experience it offers. Moreover, small to large companies can choose the pubic cloud platform based on their requirements of resource size, vertical and business need.
Advantages of Public Cloud for Small to Large Business Organizations:
- Public cloud platforms does not require instant investment and maintenance expense for the required infrastructure. Monthly subscriptions are available.
- Businesses can scale up based on the unpredictable workload demands and enjoy complete freedom of scalability and flexibility.
- Infrastructure management, resource management, software management and troubleshooting issues are completely fixed by choosing public cloud platform. Cloud platform provider ensures all the requirements of the tenant company.
- Centralized pricing has been designed to fit small to large organizations transparently based on the resource consumption.
- The costing of cloud enables companies to focus on innovation projects and follow lean growth strategies.
Highly suitable for:
- Companies with unpredictable user base and computing requirements should opt for public cloud
- Communication services business with increasing number of user base can opt for public cloud
- Companies launching offers and expecting high amount of downloads or peak demands
- Testing software applications over cloud environment
Limitations of Public Cloud Platform:
- For large volume and resource usage, the cost can shoot up for organizations with vast infrastructure requirements.
- Need to ensure highly secured infrastructure maintenance for sensitive data over cloud
- Some of the regulatory compliance and control of infrastructure should be checked
Private Cloud Platform
Any cloud platform that has been designed for the use of single organization is known as Private Cloud. The data center for the private cloud could be at the business premise or with some third party cloud vendor who has designed the platform for the business. There are many cloud service providers who can help you design the private cloud as per your business requirements.
Private cloud platforms can be customized and personalized as per the business need and enhanced as & when needed. It offers better control, visibility, scalability and reliability as the enterprise can add — manage as they need. Without compromising on the infrastructure, private cloud performance and scalability can be enhanced with additional resources and on premise data centers.
Advantages of Private Cloud for Business Organizations:
- With dedicated and secured cloud environment designed and developed as per the requirements of business, data of the private cloud cannot be accessed by any other companies as in public cloud platform.
- Customized security layer can be installed to secure the data on private cloud, using protocols, customizations, configurations and integrations
- Large business organizations with very high volume of data may require vast infrastructure which can be costly on public cloud and private cloud is most suitable.
- Organizations can get the desired results of performance, scalability and reliability for the amount of investment made on private cloud.
Highly suitable for:
- Government agencies and companies dealing in secured and confidential data may opt for private cloud.
- Companies that require personalized technology, configurations and security layer across the platform for accessing data.
- Companies which can make instant investment on private cloud that monthly subscriptions.
Limitations of Private Cloud:
- Private cloud requires large investment, dedicated resources or third party cloud service providers to maintain the infrastructure to keep it up and running.
- Private cloud is less accessible for mobile users due to security measures.
- Private cloud when designed should be based on high volume and peak time of demand otherwise scalability issues can arise.
Hybrid Cloud Infrastructure
Any cloud platform which is combination of public and private cloud platform is known as the Hybrid cloud platform. The resources of the Hybrid clouds are orchestrated in such a way that it is tightly integrated to perform the required processes. The applications and software can share the resources between the private and public cloud. With such kind of setup, organizations can gain maximum amount of performance, scalability, cost and efficiency.
Because of hybrid cloud platform, the investment cost on the resources is reduced to minimal at the same time company can enjoy the freedom of additional space over public. The security level can also be maintained and scalability can be managed. Overall it is a unique approach depending on the business requirements of the enterprise and volume of data that needs to be shared over Hybrid platform.
Advantages of Hybrid Cloud Platform for Business Organizations:
- Highly flexible policy based deployment and distribution of resources between the private and public cloud platform.
- Enhanced scalability on public cloud environments can be achieved ensuring the security level through private cloud.
- Reliability to manage varied data across public and private cloud
- Enhanced security layers even with large volume of workload and resources
Highly suitable for:
- Companies with major focus in multiple verticals including IT, Banking, regulatory, etc.
- Companies which can make investment for private cloud platform and optimize the public cloud infrastructure
- Strategically manage data to switch between the public and private cloud
Limitations of Hybrid Cloud Platform
- Managing double cost of private and public can be on the higher side for large companies with large volume of data compared to either public only or private only.
- Lack of knowledge and expertise in the market to better optimize the Hybrid cloud platform so smartly that can yield better results.
Final Take
The choice of Public, Private or Hybrid completely depends on the business requirements, applications that need to be used and amount of data volume/workload the business wants to load on cloud. If you are not sure which platform to choose then you contact our cloud expert team to provide you free consulting service on how to migrate from on premise to public/private or hybrid cloud platform.
Article Credit : https://vianalabs.com/private-cloud-vs-public-cloud-vs-hybrid-cloud-which-is-best/
