To be as productive and as cost-effective as possible, it is essential for small businesses — regardless of industry — to be strategic when allocating their budgets. Furthermore, over the past several years, small businesses have increasingly prioritized investments in technology to increase efficiency, data, and network security. Those that intend to continue expanding their businesses are encouraged to keep a finger on the pulse of how large companies are approaching infrastructure planning. However, many enterprise strategies are not affordable for small businesses due to consistently rising costs and frequent vendor-locking. Enterprise computing — “usually seen as a collection of big business software solutions to common problems such as resource management and streamlining processes” — can take several forms, ranging from public cloud to private cloud (or data centers), and even on-premise. 

Public Cloud

Public cloud providers supply users with computing resources over the Internet. These resources, which can include software applications, development platforms, complete enterprise-grade infrastructures, etc., may be accessed without charge or require payment through a subscription or pay-per-use model. Public cloud providers like Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, and Amazon Web Services own and operate data centers that run users’ workloads. Moreover, “public cloud architectures are multi-tenant environments—users share a pool of virtual resources that are automatically provisioned for and allocated to individual tenants through a self-service interface[,]… mean[ing] that multiple tenants’ workloads might be running CPU instances running on [a] shared physical server at the same time.” Flexible and easy to scale, public clouds allow small businesses to make adjustments in response to changing demands.

There are a variety of public cloud computing services accessible to modern businesses, each with unique features and service models. The three most prominent models are:

  • IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service) – This model provides users with basic compute, network, and storage resources over the Internet.
  • PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service) – This model supplies application developers an entire platform infrastructure with all required hardware and software, managed by the cloud provider.
  • SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) – This model offers users access to cloud-hosted software applications accessible through a web browser or an API. 

Private Cloud, or Data Centers

A private cloud functions exclusively for a specific company, offering that organization unshared, sequestered access to cloud infrastructure. More often than not, a private cloud operates on-premises, protected by the organization’s firewall. However, dedicated cloud providers and third-party infrastructure can also host a private cloud. By utilizing a private cloud, businesses can effectively leverage cloud functions and enjoy sizeable control over resources, data security, and data compliance. Furthermore, a private cloud enables companies to steer clear of potential ramifications — on both performance and security — associated with sharing cloud infrastructure with individuals outside of their organizations.

The responsibility of overseeing and sustaining the infrastructure of a private cloud typically belongs to the customer. Thus, in a private cloud, it is the duty of the company itself to verify that available hardware can fulfill their current and prospective needs, supervise and implement security measures, and adequately license and install any related software. However, employing a private cloud certainly offers businesses several benefits.:

  • Increased control and safeguards thanks to the protection provided by the organization’s firewall
  • More flexibility and freedom to tailor applications and infrastructure to the specific needs of the company
  • Streamlined compliance with government or industry regulations and guidelines

Compared with a public cloud, private cloud infrastructure is often much more financially burdensome with more exorbitant up-front and ongoing costs. Nevertheless, virtual private clouds (VPCs) have cropped up to combat such costs, offering many of the same advantages as an insular private cloud at a lower price and with fewer administrative costs. And with managed private cloud services — one of the latest private cloud offerings to hit the market — third-party providers are making the private cloud model more user-friendly, serving to establish, arrange, and supervise a private cloud for the organization. All in all, private cloud or private cloud-like infrastructure offers businesses a way to meet their highly specialized security, infrastructure, and regulatory needs, while simultaneously enabling optimal usage and control over their cloud environment. 

On-Premise

The traditional enterprise computing model, on-premises servers are housed on-site at a particular organization. In other words, on-premise necessitates that all hardware and software live and operate in-house. Moreover, for this reason, it can take several days to install an on-premise server properly — unlike cloud infrastructure. Additionally, on-premise solutions can work without an internet connection, making data available at all times. Although the task of implementing tight security and privacy measures must be fulfilled by the organization, having the freedom to create custom configurations to physical servers does offer businesses an opportunity for increased security.

An on-premise approach requires great investments in servers, software, and personnel, charging businesses to purchase and maintain their servers and keep additional specialized IT support on staff for server management. Moreover, an on-premise model places the burden of energy consumption on the organization as on-premise typically lays claim to between 10 and 20% of a server’s power. Additionally, although infinitely customizable, augmenting an on-premise model is not nearly as seamless ad user-friendly as upgrading a cloud plan. An on-premise solution requires the physical deployment of new servers to enhance bandwidth and capacity.

Modern Enterprise Computing with Thaalam

Speelyaal’s first modern enterprise computing, Horizontal SaaS platform, Thaalam, offers clients the visual experience to securely deploy, manage, and monitor services, applications, infrastructure, and clusters. By using a direct approach, very similar to that of IDEs or GUIs, Thaalam supplies organizations with a high level of system administration knowledge. Plus, with user-friendly and straightforward hybrid-cloud or multi-cloud functionalities, Thaalam empowers users to be independent and easily control costs. Thalam also allows businesses to take advantage of applications and open-source frameworks with just a few clicks.

By assisting companies in their efforts to lower the overhead and administrative labor necessitated by the implementation of up-to-date tech trends, Thaalam helps users save time, money, energy, and effort. Thaalam can help bring your business’s vision to life, providing the visibility, expertise, and organization needed to adequately meet your needs. With Thaalam, small businesses can control costs seamlessly, manage and secure information access, manage worldwide data centers, schedule both events and alerts, organize multi-cloud resources, as well as proactively monitor, label, and track cloud infrastructure.