#cloud Archives

How to Protect Hybrid Cloud Data

Posted on 10/11/202113/11/2021 by Tushar

Data loss can be devastating for a business, affecting operations, damaging reputations and leading to significant fines. For this reason, it is absolutely critical that those with hybrid cloud systems fully understand how to keep their data safe. In this post, we‘ll explain how this can be done.

Physical security

One key area of data protection is physical security; making sure data is not lost through power failure, natural disasters, accidents, loss or theft. To do this, datacentres are often located away from other buildings to reduce the risk of fire spreading and have more than one backup power supply available. They also have backup communications systems and secure physical security such as human patrols, access control, secure fencing and CCTV. The location of all devices is also monitored, as is logical access. The scale of this physical security is far more robust than most businesses can afford in protecting a much smaller datacentre on their own premises.

In the event that the datacentre itself is compromised, perhaps due to a natural disaster like a flood or earthquake, cloud providers remotely store backup copies of data at other datacentres and have enough inbuilt redundancy to continue service so that the data remains available.

Device failure, human error and corruption

Three common causes of data loss are device failure, human error and corruption from malware. One of the advantages of using hybrid-cloud is that data is dispersed across multiple machines managed by the cloud provider. If a failed drive occurs, the end user wonâ€™t even notice, a backup can be initiated immediately to maintain data availability. At the same time, for improved protection, it is possible to configure storage so that data cannot be erased, ensuring that saved files are always available for recovery.

Disaster recovery

Having a disaster recovery strategy is essential for any business, ensuring that in the event of a disaster, it can be back online as soon as possible. Today, many businesses use two separate storage systems to put this into place, one for primary storage and another for backup and recovery. For those using a hybrid cloud model, there is no need to do this as the same cloud storage can be used for both primary storage and for disaster recovery backup.

An additional advantage is that the storage architecture used in the hybrid cloud puts data into a single store, preventing multiple copies of files being stored on separate file servers. This cuts storage costs and eradicates the problems of having different versions of the same file being stored in different places. A hybrid cloud storage service is not only able to support file-level restore, it can also, when used with versioning, enable users to access earlier file versions if they are needed.

Security from data breach

Data breach is a significant issue for businesses and, with the advent of GDPR, could result in enormous fines. Key areas of weakness are phishing attacks and social engineering, especially where staff have saved restricted data to their personal cloud storage accounts such as Dropbox, OneDrive or Google Drive.

There a number of problems caused when staff use their personal accounts to save company data. Firstly, these personal accounts rarely offer the encryption needed to keep data secure and secondly, the company has no knowledge of what data has been shared or who with. Thirdly, the saving of data in this manner can be a violation of regulatory compliance.

While rarely malicious, these human errors are a serious threat to data security. However, by using a hybrid cloud architecture the threat can be minimised. Cloud services can provide at-rest and in transit encryption while employing ID and device management technology to limit how files can be shared and to prevent employees saving data to personal accounts. If a data breach does occur, accurate logging ensures that it will be easier to trace the source and speed up recovery.

Ongoing security

As new threats appear all the time, there is never a point at which your data is fully secure; you should always remain vigilant. To do this, regularly check that your platform has all the security features it needs and that it remains compliant with changes in regulations. You should also ensure that your cloud service provider does the same.

Conclusion

Hybrid cloud offers one of the most secure solutions for businesses, providing physical security and an end to end architecture that protects data at rest and as it moves between locations. Importantly, it does this in a more affordable way than can be achieved in an on-site datacentre. Public cloud providers, for example, can use big data and AI to monitor cloud systems for threats and vulnerabilities on a scale that would be too costly for most businesses to do on-site.

8 Popular SaaS Apps for Business

Posted on 25/10/202113/11/2021 by Tushar

There is an increasing shift within the business world from self-hosted apps to cloud-based software as a service (SaaS) applications. Using a SaaS provider offers a wealth of advantages: guaranteed availability, scalability, provider-based software management and all the benefits of web-based accessibility. These kinds of applications are ideal solutions for CRM, ERP, HR, productivity and collaboration. In this post, we‘ll look at some of the most popular apps in use today.

1. Office 365

Microsoft Office has long been the most popular productivity suite with Word, Outlook, Excel and PowerPoint providing the essential tools needed in industry and many other types of organisation. Today, Office 365 is the cloud-based version of that suite and, with over 120 million users, it is one of the most used cloud-based SaaS solutions.

Available in various editions, its applications work on PCs, tablets and smartphones and sync instantly across the internet. Itâ€™s ideal for working anywhere and collaborating with anyone.

2. Google G Suite

Google has had years to perfect its G Suite tools, offering free versions to millions of users worldwide. As a result, every part of the suite is familiar to users and the company has been able to make sure it works perfectly. G Suite for Business is the coming together of these well-known apps for business purposes: Google Docs, Sheets, Calendar, Hangouts and Gmail, where you can use your business email address instead of @gmail.com. The other differences for businesses are the increased storage capacity, improved security and data protection capabilities.

3. Slack

Slack is a next-generation collaboration app which has become very popular with businesses. It provides enterprises with a central communication hub which can be divided into separate channels for discrete teams, projects or clients. Each channel provides a single location where people can communicate and share tools and files.

One of the benefits of Slack is that it is searchable, enabling everything thatâ€™s been posted to be found. In this way, someone seeking a solution to something can quickly discover if somebody else has already found it. Perhaps the biggest advantage is that Slack has over 1,500 compatible apps in its directory which can be integrated into a channel. You can even build and use your own.

4. Box

Box is like an enterprise equivalent of Dropbox, providing businesses with cloud-based file sharing and content management facilities. What differentiates it from a standard file sharing site is its help with compliance, for example, it features GDPR auditing, key management and data residency.

One of its biggest benefits is its compatibility with many other cloud-based apps such as Office 365, G Suite, Slack and Salesforce.

5. NetSuite

NetSuite is a cloud app that enables businesses to manage their key processes within a single platform. It has functionality for ERP, CRM, PSA, eCommerce, retail and manufacturing. It can be used for resource planning, inventory tracking, financial monitoring, eCommerce hosting and customer management.

6. Salesforce Cloud

Salesforce Cloud is a customer relationship management (CRM) suite that enables enterprises to manage customer accounts, track sales leads, monitor marketing performance, manage tasks and deliver after-sales service.

Not only is it a global leader in CRM, Salesforce now offers solutions for eCommerce, customer service and marketing. And with the implementation of machine learning technology in its SaaS applications, this is an extremely powerful tool to use.

7. SAP S/4HANA Cloud

SAP S/4HANA Cloud is a SaaS version of the companyâ€™s existing ERP system that is accessible via mobile, tablet and desktop. It has management capabilities for finance, procurement, inventory and maintenance, contract processing, time and cost, HR and big data analytics.

The system provides more efficient financial accounting and liquidity management, helps reduce procurement spending and write-offs, and increases user productivity and organisational agility.

8. Microsoft Dynamics 365

Dynamics 365 is Microsoftâ€™s all-in-one cloud-based ERM and CRM solution. The software is divided into seven discrete modules: sales, marketing, field service, project service, customer service, operations and finance. These modules provide enterprises with an all-inclusive suite of apps under a single umbrella, enabling them to be managed from a central hub.

For improved security, a logical access control is built in, so that each user only has access to the particular modules that they need. At the same time, the full suite ensures that there are no errors, duplications or time wasting on the customer journey.

Conclusion

Cloud-based SaaS apps have a lot of benefits. They are easier to set up and configure than installing on your own hardware, there is guaranteed uptime, updates happen automatically, they are available anywhere there is an internet connection and on virtually all devices. There is no major investment needed as the software is leased on a subscription basis and there is the potential to scale up quickly if demand needs it. Indeed, with such a high demand for cloud apps, it is likely that traditional â€˜buy and installâ€™ software will become something of a rarity in the future.

10 Essential Features of a Cloud Backup Service

Posted on 23/10/202113/11/2021 by Tushar

What would happen to your company if it lost all its data? If your critical apps, website, database and all the essential information you need to run your business suddenly vanished. You may be tempted to say that it doesn’t bear thinking about. But it does, because it happens. Hard drive failure, acts of God, human error, hacking, all these things and more can result in data death and without a backup, there’s no chance of a quick recovery.

Backups should be non-negotiable. Without them, there’s a significant risk of business failure. With them, disasters can be overcome quickly, enabling your company to get back on its feet.

That said, not all backup solutions are the same. Today, many companies have shifted their backups to the cloud as a way speed up recovery, save money and benefit from improved services. In this post, we’ll explain why cloud backups are so popular and what to look for in a provider.

Cloud backups explained

Cloud backup is third-party service that enables customers to store data, remotely, on the internet. Businesses using the cloud can backup, manage and recover data much more easily than with traditional methods that require additional, on-site storage.

The cloud offers flexibility to cope with varying storage requirements, provides affordable pay as you go pricing and gives complete control over what data is saved and how frequently you choose to back it up.

10 features you should look for in a good backup service

1. Storage space

Cloud providers charge customers based on the amount of data storage they use. Whilst this works out less expensive than buying your own storage servers, you still need to consider what your likely requirements are. This will entail looking at the size of a single backup and then multiplying this by the number of backups you want to preserve at any point in time. This will help you compare the rates of individual providers.

2. Look for scalable storage

The amount of data you need backing up can vary. As your company grows, your storage requirements are likely to increase and, if you occasionally carry out large-scale projects, you might want a temporary backup of the data you are using.

A good service provider will let customers increase their storage capacity on a flexible â€˜as needed basis, enabling you to scale up with growth or to cover short-term needs.

3. High availability

What could be worse than suffering a data loss and then finding out that your backup server was offline when you need to do a disaster recovery? One thing can: discovering the server is regularly offline, so your scheduled backups didn’t take place and your critical data didn’t get saved.

It is crucial that your cloud backup provider offers a high availability service that is guaranteed to stay online. If it doesn’t provide 99.95% or higher, go somewhere else.

4. Vendor disaster recovery

You use a backup service to protect you in the case of data loss. But what would happen if the vendors backup server went down? Before choosing a backup service, make sure that it has its own disaster recovery plan in operation too.

Most service providers have multilocation backups which store several copies of your backups at different data centres. So, even if a fire takes out a complete data centre, one of the copies stored elsewhere can be brought online immediately. Make sure your service provider has this solution in place.

5. Backup frequency as required

Some businesses need to back up their data far more frequently than others. If you have a busy eCommerce business, for example, you may need constant backups so that you do not lose any very recent transactions if data is lost.

Some backup services give customers total control over the frequency of their backups and enable them to be scheduled at times which are most convenient. Others only offer a limited number of backups and at times scheduled by the vendor. Make sure you choose the option which best suits your company’s needs.

6. Backup security

The security of your cloud backups is highly important when you consider the number cyber attacks that take place. If you are passing that security to a third-party, make sure they have robust measures in place to keep your data out of the hands of hackers.

Ideally, they should have intrusion prevention, 256-bit encryption for storage and data transfer, Secure Socket Layer (SSL) or Transport Layer Protection (TLS) and use multilocation data storage. In addition, the physical data centres should also be well-guarded with security staff, CCTV and access control in place.

7. Data compliance

Data regulation is getting stricter all the time. If you hold personal information you are required to comply with the Data Protection Act and the new GDPR regulation. Even if your data is backed up by a third-party cloud provider, you are still responsible for it. Make sure, therefore, that your provider meets industry standards and follows best practice to help you stay compliant.

8. 24/7 technical support

Backups are essential if you need to recover from a data loss. However, if a disaster does happen, the technical difficulties in getting back online quickly can be challenging. It’s times like these when you need a service provider that does more than simply provide a backup server.

To give yourself the best chance of meeting your Recovery Time Objective, you need a provider that can assist with the technical issues no matter what time of day. To ensure this happens, choose a cloud backup provider that offers expert, 24/7 technical support.

Ideally, support should be available via telephone, online chat and email. This way, should one communication channel be unavailable, there are others you can still use to get the problem solved.

9. Read the T & Cs

Check any terms and conditions carefully before signing up to a backup service. A good cloud backup provider will give guarantees and SLAs to ensure you receive an effective service. Also, check if there are any limitations that might prevent your company carrying out backup operations in the way it needs.

10. What customers think

The quality of the backup service and how well it suits the needs of your company should always be your main priority. If you are unsure about a cloud backup provider, we always recommend looking at customer reviews as these often provide a useful insight into the quality of the company, the services it provides and the support it gives its clients.

Conclusion

From reading this post you should have a clear understanding of how critical it is to back up your data. You should also see how cloud backups provide a quick, flexible and cost-efficient way to back up, store and recover data in the event of a disaster. Hopefully, the 10 points we have raised will help you find the right provider to look after your data.

SharePoint vs OneDrive for Business

Posted on 11/10/202113/11/2021 by Anteelo Master

Most organisations today have numerous choices close by for saving their documents. Generally, you’d store your documents on an external pen drive, HDD, or other media. Obviously, the drawback to utilising these strategies is that you have to keep the storage device handy all the time to access your documents. This isn’t always possible, as they can without much of a stretch get lost. In addition, it turns out to be practically difficult to share these documents with your associates or companions, except if you plan on mailing those copies each and every time without fail.

These days, virtual storage arrangements permit us to store our records on shared servers and access them from a large number of gadgets, any time, anywhere. Two cloud-based stages that allow you to spare, share, and match up documents across devices are Microsoft’s SharePoint and OneDrive for Business. One of the most common questions that pops up in the various organisation is ”SharePoint vs OneDrive, which one is better?” Right now, assess the fundamental contrasts between these two to find the answer to this question and see which is better for your business.

Lets first begin with understanding each one of them:

What is SharePoint?

SharePoint is a web-based collaborative platform expected to improve the working procedure in large associations and is proposed for a better joint effort of clients, record work process, and automation of operations. You can make a SharePoint portal, including wiki destinations, web journals, and dashboards where you can distribute archives and remarks. The principle highlights of SharePoint are:

The capacity to make a straightforward organisation structure in the digital arrangement.
Improvement of correspondence among department and employees. You can make dashboards to examine ventures and undertakings.
Control of settling errands and control of assignments that are being taken a shot at.
Clients can team up and alter a record shared on the server at the same time, just as trade archives, news, joins and different assets.
Automation of business forms – you don’t have to play out a noteworthy rundown of activities physically, permitting your you team to spare time.
A SharePoint portal permits you to make a corporate site.

The interface of a SharePoint portal permits you to produce reports, inform teams about significant occasions, distribute news, tune business forms with structures, and make client profiles. SharePoint has extensive utility and can be incorporated with other Microsoft Office applications and messengers

What is OneDrive?

Microsoft OneDrive is a cloud stockpiling administration that permits clients to store records in the Microsoft Cloud. OneDrive was previously known as SkyDrive, FolderShare, Windows Live Office, and LiveMesh. You can access OneDrive with or without an internet browser by introducing the OneDrive application. There are two kinds of OneDrive – OneDrive and OneDrive for Business.

OneDrive for Business (previously known as SkyDrive Pro) is similar to OneDrive yet contains additional highlights planned for business purposes. An association manager oversees OneDrive for business for users in your team to collaborate on records and different documents. The overseer can confine sharing alternatives for users. Users should sign in by utilising a work account, not an individual record so as to utilise OneDrive for Business. Unique maintenance arrangements that are accessible for OneDrive for Business permit executives to recoup documents erased by users. Different users can alter a report at the same time, and record forming is likewise accessible.

OneDrive for Business can be utilised independently (Office 365 Business plan) and with SharePoint Online (Office 365 Business Premium Plan). An organisation’s SharePoint libraries can be synchronized to the nearby PC of a user by utilising OneDrive. OneDrive for Business and SharePoint Online can be incorporated with one another. You can consider OneDrive as backend stockpiling and SharePoint can be considered the frontend interface to all the more likely envision how the mix of these two stages is actualised. A connect to documents partook in OneDrive can be utilised as a connection for SharePoint Online.

SharePoint vs OneDrive for Business

The following table compares the features of SharePoint vs OneDrive:

OneDrive for Business	SharePoint Online
Available in business as well as consumer variant.	Available only for business use with no specific consumer variant.
Referred to as a storage location	Referred to as a team site
Can be perceived as a cloud version of my documents	Is more or less like a website
Al files are set to private permissions unless specified.	Uses default permissions as set by user
No shared interface	Users access through organisations domain
Appropriate for uploading private documents which are not intended to be shared	Suitable for public documents which need to be shared frequently.
OneDrive cannot include the additional security of a standalone server.	SharePoint can include the supplementary security of a standalone server.
Content In OneDrive can not be published to a webpage	Allows publishing of documents directly to the website
Evolved from SharePoint workspace 2010, which was previously called Groove 2007.	Cloud-based adaptation of the SharePoint service which belongs to the era of Office XP

Similarities between SharePoint and OneDrive for Business

Both of them are a part of Office 365 Business plans
Both are available as a stand-alone service.
The core architecture of both platforms is built on SharePoint.
Both of them manage files/data with versioning and metadata.
Both of them can be accessed by a browser as well as the local folder

CONCLUSION

So the reality, when looking at SharePoint versus OneDrive, is actually about how you intend to utilise it. Picking an answer relies upon the requirements of your organisation. In the event that you have to store records in the virtual storage, or offer documents and at times, alter records together with different users at the same time, you can utilise Microsoft OneDrive for Business. In the event that you have to make a corporate web-based interface for a coordinated effort of a high number of users in your organisation, consider utilising SharePoint Online, which is a discretionary segment of Microsoft Office 365. OneDrive for Business can be incorporated with SharePoint and can be utilised as storage for content transferred to a site dependent on the SharePoint stage. Both OneDrive and SharePoint Online work with the inalienable security of Microsoft items.

Cloud Computing for Beginners: A Complete Guide

Posted on 22/05/202103/06/2021 by Anteelo Master

Introduction to Cloud Computing

Before cloud computing came into the picture, many companies used traditional servers to carry out operations, processes and data storage. Eventually, it became challenging and costly to completely rely on other companies later, for computing, data processing and storage. But thanks to the big giants today, for creating advanced cloud computing services for making computing and storage more convenient and manageable.

Cloud computing is a leading edge technology that stands for the delivery of high-demand computing services including applications, storage, and power processing, entirely over the internet. It means that instead of using external computer hardware and software, cloud computing offers the entire computing and data storage and processing service over the internet only.

In simpler terms, cloud computing is the practice of using a network of remote servers that are hosted on the internet. The purpose is to store, manage and process data effortlessly rather than relying on a local server or personal computer system.

For decades computer industries used to work by storing data and running programs from the hard drive. But ever since businesses have adopted the cloud computing service, with the help of online connection, it has become flexible to manage resources anytime and anywhere.

Cloud computing gives users easy access to use online services that are available through any device with an internet connection. Users don’t require to be in a certain location to utilize this service as ‘The Cloud’ is almost everywhere these days. In fact, here are some examples of companies that provide their services online through cloud services:

Understanding How Cloud Computing Works

Here is a layman’s guide to how to understand cloud computing works. Basically, cloud has two main sections: the front-end and the back-end. These sections are connected to each other through the internet network. The front-end is the user or client-side of the computer whereas the back-end includes ‘The Cloud’ section of the computer system.

The front-end that consists of the client’s computer enables the user to access data stored in the cloud with the help of the internet browser or with a cloud software. Although, all cloud computing systems do not necessarily have to use the same user interface.

On the other hand, the back-end of the cloud technology system is responsible for storing data and information securely. It includes servers, computers, data storage systems, and central servers. The central server uses a certain set of rules called protocols to facilitate operations. To ensure seamless connectivity between computers or devices that are linked through cloud , it uses middle-ware software.

Apart from these two main section components, the cloud computing services fall under three broad models:

Infrastructure as a Service(IaaS):

In this most basic service model of cloud computing, where the user can rent network connectivity, IT infrastructure resources like data center, servers, storage networking hardware and cloud computing security compliance from a cloud service provider. The enterprise can use the IaaS and customize it accordingly so as to build a cost-effective software offering.

Platform as a Service(PaaS)

This cloud computing service offers an on-demand environment to develop, test, deliver and manage software applications. The PaaS is designed for developers to make it easier for them to promptly develop websites or mobile applications without having to worry about the setup or management of underlying infrastructure resources.

Software as a Service (SaaS)SaaS is the largest model in the cloud market that is growing rapidly today. This model uses the web browser to deliver applications to clients that are managed by the third party vendor. Whereas, its interface is accessed to the client side. Most of the SaaS applications do not require to be downloaded as these directly run from the web browser but some plugins are required to be installed.

The Virtualization in Cloud Computing

Just like its name, cloud computing is very vast as it holds various processes, operations, and management. Similarly, it involves a process of cloud computing virtualization. The cloud computing virtualization allows a user to utilize the same server to run multiple applications and operating systems, thus providing an efficient utilization of resources as well as reducing costs.

There are four main cloud computing virtualization types:

Application Virtualization:

The application virtualization helps users to have remote access to the application from a server. The server stores the personal information and other application characteristics but still holds the potential to run on a local workstation with the internet connection.

Network Virtualization:

It is the ability to run multiple virtual networks that individually have a separate control and data plan. Network virtualization provides the facility to create and provision virtual networks such as logical switches, routers, firewalls, VPN, and workload security, either within days or even within weeks.

Desktop Virtualization:

This desktop virtualization enables users to emulate a workstation load in place of a server. It allows users to access their desktop remotely regardless of any location by a different machine. It offers the benefit of user portability, mobility, effortless management of software like installation, updates, and patches.

Server Virtualization:

This is more of a technique to mask server resources. Server virtualization stimulates physical servers by altering their identities, numbers, processors and their operating systems. This spares users from the burden of continuously managing complex server resources.

How does Cloud Computing Benefit an Organization?

Cloud computing is just not about trendy applications that people use for storing photos and videos online. It plays a major part in the business model nowadays and has taken the world by storm! With the help of cloud servives, businesses are not only getting the benefit of storing and accessing data but also the benefit of operating businesses innovatively.

Following are the advantages that cloud computing benefits organizations with today:

Cost Saving

It has been really expensive to run, manage, and deploy local systems for a long time and not to forget how much capital it has cost. With cloud computing, a user doesn’t require going through monthly expenditure of maintenance as everything is handled by the service provider itself.

Flexibility

Managing resources becomes quite easier with cloud computing as one has to simply pay for the resources that are being used each month. It offers the ease of process and operation as the Cloud storage providers offer flexible packages in which one can add or reduce the amount of storage that one pays to use.

Data Recovery

Cyberattacks can destroy a huge amount of data if everything is stored in physical servers and hard drives. As a result, it will not only lead to data loss but also to customer trust in the organization. With cloud computing, these issues are less likely to happen and even if it happens, there are massive storage locations where the data will always be safely present as a copy at another location.

Increased Security

With cloud hosting, your organization is always protected against hacking and internal data thefts. It offers a robust firewall technology that offers features like intrusion prevention systems and in streaming virus protection.

Migrating ERP to the Cloud

Posted on 04/07/202008/06/2021 by Anteelo Master

Many large companies are considering migrating their ERP applications — including SAP S/4HANA — to the public cloud. Drivers for many companies include cost, flexibility or adopting a cloud-first strategy.

Q: What questions do companies ask when they are considering moving ERP applications to a public cloud?

A: First, they ask “Can I move?” These are large, robust systems, and companies want to make sure their apps are technically capable of running in the cloud. The second question they ask is “Should I move?” They want to be confident that when they migrate their mission-critical applications, they can continue running their business. And the third question is, how expensive is a public cloud? We manages, migrates and runs some of the most complex SAP systems in the world, so I know firsthand that SAP can run effectively in the cloud. SLAs and maintenance can continue in the cloud, and cloud security is well-covered. Cost reduction can be one of the big benefits of public cloud but only if the design, migration and run phases are properly managed.

Q: How do companies decide when the right time is to make the move?

A: Some of our customers have a good business case for waiting to upgrade, but most are exploring their options. Moving to SAP S/4HANA or other ERP systems is a big change, so why not move to cloud at the same time? These are big systems that handle companies’ finance and production lines, so there is often a limited maintenance window to bring them down. If a transition is on your roadmap, you’ll save yourself a step. And in the current macroeconomic climate, a slowdown in system usage is a good time to make changes in preparation for heavier future traffic.

Q: What business disruption can a company expect when it migrates to the cloud?

A: Moving to the cloud is not very different from any other migration. It’s become a routine process, and when done correctly, companies can expect close to near-zero downtime.

Companies can mitigate risks even more if they first test out the migration with one business unit and a single proof of concept. They also should clean up all the data they don’t need before migrating.

Q: What benefits have clients achieved?

A: The benefits are elasticity, agility and being able to grow on command. In the case of SAP, companies can tap into its new analytics capabilities as well as those of the ecosystem they gain when moving to the hyperscalers’ clouds.

If you want to look at business outcomes, consider Croda International, a global chemical manufacturer. It wanted to take advantage of the on-demand capabilities of cloud while increasing the ability of its IT department to respond to business demands. The company developed a strategy for moving to the cloud in anticipation of a major upgrade to SAP S/4HANA. By deploying our Platform as a Service for SAP on Azure as part of a low-risk, phased approach, 106 workloads were migrated in just 12 weeks.

Q: How should companies start the whole process?

A: Companies need to have true conversations — within the business and with their systems integrator. The new environments are richer and easier to consume and combine. At the same time, companies need to think about cost control and avoid lock-in or technical debt. They need to think about what they are trying to achieve, both digitally and in their business. They can introduce new technology. They can think about connecting their SAP landscape to machine learning or the internet of things (IoT). They can introduce new features to customers and suppliers. In the cloud, they can leverage so many things they weren’t able to access before. Thinking about the end state will allow companies to move their businesses forward.

The Impact of Cloud Hosting on Retail

Posted on 06/05/202016/06/2021 by Tushar

Technology is changing the retail landscape at a dramatic rate. The proportion of online sales continues to grow (from 2.8% in 2006 to 32.8% in 2020 – source: ONS), there are more ways to sell than ever before and the lines between online and in-store shopping are becoming increasingly blurred. To stay competitive, many retail are now adopting the cloud to free them from the constraints of in-house IT systems, enable them to be more agile and let them take advantage of the latest technologies. Here, we’ll look at how cloud is transforming retail.

Operational integration

One of the major advantages of cloud over legacy in-house IT systems is that it enables data to be easily unified and systems like communications, marketing, inventory and shipping to be integrated. This provides businesses with a greater understanding of their business and more control over their operations. Instead of separate, disjointed systems, they are provided with a business-wide IT infrastructure that provides operational seamlessness.

As a result, companies are able to make operational savings, teams can collaborate better, new approaches can be developed and customer experiences can be improved.

Better visibility of supply chain and inventory

With all parts of the business connected to the cloud, retailers can have company-wide visibility of their supply chain and inventory. The cloud-based technology, blockchain, for example, offers retailers a clearer overview of the supply chain, giving them the ability to track the origin and movement of goods and create financial audit trails.

With inventory, businesses can have stock information in real-time, ensuring they have up to date information of what’s in stock and where it is. This can help them maintain stock levels, offer customers click and collect from individual stores and give the company a better understanding of what is and isn’t selling.

Seamless supplier integration

From the procurement of stock to shipping and aftersales, retailers collaborate with numerous partners to provide services to their customers. Cloud technology enables retail and their suppliers to integrate systems, providing real-time status information. Retailers can know where their incoming consignments and outgoing deliveries are, access data from outsourced communications partners or loyalty programs and share documents with suppliers.

What’s more, some of this information can be used to enhance the customer experience, for example, sharing delivery tracking information and enabling customers to modify delivery instructions en-route, in real-time.

Personalised customer experience

Not only are customers attracted to retailers that offer personalisation; many are willing to pay more for the experience. Personalisation means the shopping experience is tailored to individual customers; they are given product recommendations and offers that are relevant to their wants and needs and this saves them a great deal of time finding the right items. This convenience makes them loyal shoppers and increases LTV.

The essential ingredient for personalisation is customer data, ideally a complete map of the customer journey. It is here where cloud plays an important role, providing real-time data on browsing and purchasing histories and linking it to all the other information the business holds on a customer to provide product recommendations and other services that are personalised for the individual.

Business intel

While retailers gather a lot of valuable data, making use of it has, historically, been hampered because it was stored in different departmental silos, sometimes on separate IT systems. Cloud enables data to be unified, stored centrally and accessed by anyone who is permitted to use it.

As a result, datasets that had previously been kept isolated can be brought together to provide a far more detailed analysis. With cloud’s ability to offer big data analytics, together with advanced technologies like AI and machine learning, the capacity to gain new insights has never been greater. Retail that use the cloud have benefitted from finding ways to save money, improve and automate operations and deliver new and better services for their customers. What’s more, the cloud enables them to do this quicker than ever before, giving the ability to react swiftly to changes in the marketplace.

A cost-effective IT solution

As retailers become increasingly reliant on IT, many have struggled with the cost. Cloud has enabled these businesses to shrink IT costs considerably. With cloud vendors providing the IT infrastructure, retailers no longer need to purchase and maintain expensive in-house datacentres of their own. The cloud’s pay-as-you-go payment structure is also beneficial, enabling retailers to scale up or down as demand requires, while only paying for the resources they use. And there’s no limit to the resources that are at a retailer’s disposal, should it need them.

Additionally, there are no hardware maintenance costs to pay and the service is managed, freeing up time for IT staff to work on business oriented projects. Even software is less expensive, with many cloud-based apps being open-source and vendors able to offer the most popular proprietary apps at lower costs.

Conclusion

Cloud has become the go-to solution for retails, with migration accelerating significantly since the pandemic. Its ability to unify and integrate systems and data and make use of modern technologies like data analytics, AI and machine learning has provided retailers with better intelligence to improve all aspects of their businesses, cut costs and enhance user experience.

Why Do Finance Companies Require the Cloud?

Posted on 05/05/202016/06/2021 by Tushar

The need for robust security and to comply with stringent data privacy regulations have, until recently, prevented many finance companies opting for cloud computing. Today, however, there’s a growing shift towards the cloud as more organization adopt digital-first approaches in a bid to stay relevant in the rapidly advancing, technology-based market. Cloud technology provides finance companies with the infrastructure needed for digital transformation, helping them to improve customer experience, drive growth and stay competitive, all while enabling them to remain compliant with regulations. Here, we’ll examine why finance companies need cloud computing.

Cloud keeps financial data secure

It is no surprise that finance organisations are heavily regulated. The data they hold is highly sensitive and includes both the financial information of customers and details of trading operations. This makes it an extremely valuable target for cybercriminals which, if stolen, could have a major impact on personal and business customers and on the financial company itself. Organisations within the sector therefore need to put security at the centre of their IT operations and must develop a secure infrastructure that robustly defends them against attacks.

The issue for many finance companies is that achieving such security in-house is not easy to accomplish. State of the art security tools are expensive to implement and require specialist expertise. Cloud providers, however, already have both the tools and the expertise in place to keep their infrastructure and their customers’ systems and data secure. This also helps them maintain compliance with regulations like GDPR and PCI DSS. Migrating to the cloud, therefore, can provide levels of security far better than most companies can achieve on-site and in most cases, come included in the cost of the service.

Cloud vendors provide protection for finance companies in a number of important ways. For those with concerns over the multitenancy of the public cloud, for example, this can be overcome by adopting a hybrid cloud infrastructure where data is housed in a single-tenancy private cloud and applications on the public cloud.

Of course, whether public or private, the cloud system will be robustly protected by a powerful arsenal of leading-edge security tools. These include state of the art, next-gen firewalls, like the FortiGate firewalls used at eukhost, as well as intrusion detection and prevention tools, anti-malware, data encryption, SSL certificates, DDoS protection, VPNs, email verification and encryption tools, spam filtering and more.

The providers themselves have to comply with stringent security regulations and will have their own security policies and procedures in place. These will include ensuring that they have enough redundancy in their system to maintain services should one of their datacentres be taken offline, providing backup power and cooling systems, maintaining physical security of the premises, and guaranteeing availability with an SLA. This way, they can ensure a company’s financial data remains secure and available at all times.

With regard to GDPR, financial institutions need to be careful that vendors do not store their data in countries that do not provide the necessary guarantees for privacy. Any data stored in datacentres in the USA, for example, can be legally accessed by the US government security agencies if they think it pertinent to an investigation. As this contravenes GDPR, the data of UK and EU citizens should not be stored in such countries. This is why, at eukhost, all our datacentres are located within the UK.

Taking advantage of the cloud

Financial companies that have already migrated to the cloud have put themselves in pole position to benefit from the digital revolution taking place in the market. They are able to adopt and make use of advanced fintech solutions, develop and deploy new services at speed, and analyse big data using tools like AI and machine learning to discover new growth opportunities, predict market movements and find more cost-effective and efficient ways to operate.

With data centralised and synced, teams can collaborate on projects far more effectively, regardless of where in the world they work, employees can work remotely and customers can access their accounts, services and communications via the gamut of devices that they now make use of.

The speed at which the cloud operates also provides benefits. Servers and applications can be deployed instantly and workloads that would have taken weeks to carry out on traditional systems can be done far quicker. Indeed, the interconnectivity of the cloud provides a genuine opportunity for finance companies to benefit from the use of real-time data, enabling them to react swiftly to changes in the market.

Cutting costs

The growing reliance on IT in the finance sector has burdened companies with the ongoing costs of using it. The cloud provides significant opportunities to reduce and better manage those costs. By moving to the cloud, companies no longer need to invest in expensive hardware or pay for the running of a datacentre. Instead of capital expenditure, they shift to operational expenditure and have greater control over what is spent, by whom and when.

Additionally, the scalability of the cloud enables finance companies to increase IT resources on-demand. Whether catering for peaks in website traffic or undertaking resource-heavy processing, their system can access all the storage, bandwidth, CPU and RAM it needs to maintain service. The advantage, financially, is that this is charged for on a pay-per-use basis. Once the demand has ceased, the company can scale down and reduce costs.

Preparing for the future

The pandemic has not only hastened the drive for digital transformation across all sectors; it has also seen customers flock to digital in unprecedented numbers. This ‘push-me-pull-you’ relationship is driving the finance sector along the digital railroad. Consumers are pushing for better online services and customer experiences and financial companies are pulling new customers in by providing them. Increasingly, those services need cloud infrastructure and cloud-based applications to make use of technologies like AI, machine learning, IoT and automation.

Conclusion

Cloud technology opens a world of opportunity for finance companies, enabling them to innovate quickly, improve customer experiences and work smarter and more efficiently. At the same time, it provides a compliant environment in which to store their sensitive data and keep it secure.

How the Cloud Benefits Charities and the Public Sector

Posted on 03/05/202016/06/2021 by Tushar

Cloud technology brings significant advantages for all organisations, not just businesses. Today, it is being increasingly adopted by both charities and the public sector, including local authorities, healthcare providers, universities and government agencies. Here, we’ll look at the financial savings and operational benefits it can offer, as well as how it can provide a better service to your end-users.

Remote connectivity

Even before the pandemic forced people to work at home, charities and public sector organisations were leading the way with remote working. While many charities have people working around the country and, in some instances, around the globe, the public sector was dealing with austerity by shrinking office space to cut costs and having employees work remotely several days of the week.

One of the benefits of the public cloud is that it enables your employees to work from wherever they have an internet connection. Here, they can log in to your system and access your applications and documents securely. What’s more, data is stored centrally, not on individual machines, meaning that it is kept secure and that everyone has the latest version of files and information available to them. Indeed, modern, cloud-based remote working solutions allow colleagues to collaborate, share work and hold meetings online, no matter where on the planet they are based.

The benefits of remote connectivity are many. For example, you can reduce the size of your office space, allow employees greater flexibility over their working arrangements, recruit employees from further afield and ensure things like bad weather don’t prevent staff from working.

Financial savings

Charities and the public sector both increasingly rely on IT services to carry out many of their day to day functions. Running IT on-site, however, can be a major financial burden, especially for organisations that need to reserve as much of their budgets as possible to deliver frontline services.

Cloud migration can help cut IT costs dramatically. The main reason for this is that, in the cloud, you will be hosting your applications and storing your data on hardware belonging to your IT vendor. This means you will no longer need to purchase, regularly upgrade and maintain those expensive servers. Nor will you need to pay for the ongoing costs of an in-house datacentre, such as premises rent, high energy bills, insurance or security. And of course, your in-house IT staff will no longer need to manage or maintain that hardware, giving them more time to work on projects that benefit the end-user.

Greater security

Keeping data secure is an essential requirement for charities and the public sector, with organisations often handling sensitive information about individuals. Whilst a reticence to move this to the cloud can be understood, it is worth pointing out that the cloud is likely to be more secure than most in-house systems.

Unlike many charities and public sector organisations, cloud vendors invest significantly in cybersecurity to ensure they comply with their stringent security regulations. They employ security experts and deploy highly advanced security tools to keep their infrastructure and data secure. Indeed, even the datacentre premises are protected by robust security measures.

Additionally, the cloud allows all data to be centrally stored, enables organisations to implement strict logical control and access privileges and lets data be swiftly backed up, encrypted and integrity tested. For those requiring additional security, there is also the option of migrating to a private cloud, where a single client has dedicated use of their cloud infrastructure.

Staying online

Often hosting critical, public-facing services, charities and public sector organisations need their applications to remain available for their staff and end-users. For those with in-house datacentres, server failure can be a significant issue, in some circumstances putting lives at risk. Bringing a server back online can be a timely and expensive procedure that causes prolonged disruption to your services.

In the cloud, your applications are run on virtual machines which means they are not tied to any physical hardware. If there is a hardware issue in a cloud datacentre, the virtual machine is simply and instantly moved to different physical hardware and continues without any downtime or disruption. With exceptional levels of uptime, guaranteed by SLA, the cloud offers the high availability needed to stay online.

Scalability

One of the most sought after benefits of the cloud is its scalability. This is the ability of the charity or public sector organisation to use additional computing resources (storage, CPU, RAM and bandwidth) on-demand, at the click of a mouse.

There are two chief benefits of this. Firstly, is that it enables your organisation to cope with peaks in demand or heavy workloads, ensuring you don’t run out of IT resources when you need them most. For example, your website won’t crash if you get a massive spike in traffic, something which could be dangerous if dealing with an emergency situation.

The other benefit is the financial one. In the cloud, you will only pay for any additional resources as and when you need them, on a pay as you go basis. When demand reduces, you can scale down once again and save money. Achieving such scalability in-house would be difficult and expensive to do – you would need to purchase additional servers and leave them redundant just so they could be used in times of heavy demand.

Conclusion

Charities and public sector organisations are making increased use of the cloud to benefit in all the ways mentioned above. Indeed, the UK Government’s keenness to encourage cloud adoption has led to the launch of its G-Cloud. This is a marketplace of approved cloud vendors with framework agreements already in place, from which public sector organisations can buy services without needing to run a full tender or competition procurement process. Anteelo is an approved G-Cloud supplier.

Digital Success in 2021: Sustainability and Customer Experience

Posted on 28/04/202016/06/2021 by Tushar

The online market has radically transformed and businesses need to move with the times if they are going to stay relevant and competitive. In this post, we’ll look at the impact of sustainability and customer experience and explain what you need to do to stay ahead of the game.

The sustainable business

Consumers worldwide are becoming increasingly conscious of how their actions have an impact on the environment and society. This affects their choice of brands and the products and services they buy. Ideally, they would like their favourite brands to adopt more ethical approaches to the environment and society, but if not, they are prepared to find new brands whose values better align with their own.

What does this mean for online businesses? First, it means that companies need to be ethical. They have to try and reduce their impact on the environment by cutting carbon emissions, using sustainable resources, ditching single-use plastics and anything else that improves the natural world. At the same time, they will need to implement socially ethical policies: delivering diversity and equality of opportunity, paying fair wages and treating staff, customers and suppliers well.

Of course, ethical businesses should also communicate this to consumers. Getting the message out is important to remind existing customers and to inform potential new ones of the efforts they are making to be a sustainable and ethical business. This should be clearly communicated on websites, in blog posts, on social media and on other forms of communication.

What’s more, consumers expect responsible brands to apologise for and make amends for both historical and more recent mistakes. One of the UK’s major pub chains has recently been commended for apologising for one of its founders profiting from the slave trade and more recently has renamed pubs whose original names might be seen to be racially offensive. Such acts of contrition that show a clean break with the past and a desire to move forward more ethically have helped consumers see the business in a more positive light.

With 87% of consumers having a more positive view of companies that support social or environmental issues, sustainability has become an important battleground on which companies compete for new business. To be a successful online business in 2021, this is an area that calls out for development, not just for the sake of the business, but for the planet and society as a whole.

Customer experience

The other key area of competition is customer experience and for online businesses, this is often driven by the adoption of new technologies. In the digital marketplace, customer experience has real value for consumers: over 80% of them are prepared to pay more for products and services if the experience is great.

What do we mean by great customer experience? Today, it means 24/7 accessibility, speed, convenience and seamlessness. Customers expect personalisation, omnichannel shopping and omnichannel communications. They want presenting with the products and offers they are looking for, purchasing to be easy and delivery to be ultra-quick. What’s more, they want to be able to buy on any device (and in-store), have communications delivered via their channel of choice and they want the whole experience to be engaging and rewarding.

It’s a big ask – but one which many companies have already adopted and are benefitting from. Implementing digital transformation today will not put companies head of the field, but it will ensure they stay relevant to the modern consumer and help them catch up with and compete with their rivals.

It’s almost impossible to offer great customer service today without adopting cloud technology. The cloud is needed to analyse the data essential for generating customer journey maps, without which it’s impossible to offer truly personalised product recommendations or provide seamless experiences. It’s also needed to carry out data analytics to gain insights into new opportunities and ways to cut costs.

The cloud is also vital for making use of technologies such as AI, machine learning and automation, that help deliver improved customer experience. It lets companies deploy 24/7 website chatbots, send instantaneous automated messages via multiple channels, maintain control of inventory and delivery so that products remain in stock and arrive quickly.

The cloud also provides the ability to integrate various key services, such as websites, apps, social media channels, communications channels, in-store services, marketing services, production infrastructure and more.

Of course, the cloud is also the most cost-effective way to run all these services. There’s no need to purchase hardware, it provides the flexibility to scale up or down resources in line with demand, there are fewer security and IT management demands and businesses will be assured their apps remain available at all times.

Conclusion

In the 2021 marketplace, sustainability and customer experience have become the main areas on which businesses compete. These have become more important to consumers than price or products. To stay relevant, online businesses need to be more environmentally-friendly, socially ethical and deliver better customer experience. This may mean a shift in direction for the company and in how it markets itself. With customer experience, it also requires digital transformation and the adoption of cloud technology.

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London, UK

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India (HQ)

Atlanta

London

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Physical security

Device failure, human error and corruption

Disaster recovery

Security from data breach

Ongoing security

Conclusion

1. Office 365

2. Google G Suite

3. Slack

4. Box

5. NetSuite

6. Salesforce Cloud

7. SAP S/4HANA Cloud

8. Microsoft Dynamics 365

Conclusion

Cloud backups explained

10 features you should look for in a good backup service

1. Storage space

2. Look for scalable storage

3. High availability

4. Vendor disaster recovery

5. Backup frequency as required

6. Backup security

7. Data compliance

8. 24/7 technical support

9. Read the T & Cs

10. What customers think

Conclusion

What is SharePoint?

What is OneDrive?

SharePoint vs OneDrive for Business

Similarities between SharePoint and OneDrive for Business

CONCLUSION

Introduction to Cloud Computing

Understanding How Cloud Computing Works

The Virtualization in Cloud Computing

How does Cloud Computing Benefit an Organization?

Operational integration

Better visibility of supply chain and inventory

Seamless supplier integration

Personalised customer experience

Business intel

A cost-effective IT solution

Conclusion

Cloud keeps financial data secure

Taking advantage of the cloud

Cutting costs

Preparing for the future

Conclusion

Remote connectivity

Financial savings

Greater security

Staying online

Scalability

Conclusion

The sustainable business

Customer experience

Conclusion

Delivering excellence, collaborating across time zones.

Take a look at our global hideouts.​

Contact

India (HQ)

Atlanta, USA

London, UK

Dubai, UAE

Melbourne, Australia

Surabaya, Indonesia

India (HQ)

Atlanta

London

Dubai

Australia

Indonesia

Take a look at our global hideouts.