The radical expansion of cloud computing thoroughly changed the way organizations handle data while doing business. Data trading through the cloud is not new anymore. More than 90 percent of organizations are already using cloud computing at least to some extent and there is no slowing down. In this article, we will look into some of the most important cloud trends of 2021.

Why is cloud computing popular?

Cloud computing completely changed the traditional way of handling data. With so much to offer, it is irresistible to stay out of it. A few of the benefits that made cloud computing so popular are scalability, high-end data security, increased productivity by real-time simultaneous data maintenance, zero maintenance, cost saving, and remote access. Moreover, with basic networking and IT knowledge, you can become a certified cloud computing expert by taking online cloud computing training and clearing certification exams. 

Top 10 cloud computing trends to look out for 

• Multi- and hybrid-cloud computing

Businesses now identified that one specific cloud platform or infrastructure might not be the best solution to every case in hand. Sometimes it is a different vendor, sometimes it is not even cloud. The current trend is that organizations are not sticking with a single path, rather opting for multi-cloud or hybrid-cloud models so that they get what is best for each out of all possibilities. Expected by the start of 2022, 90 percent of organizations will rely on hybrid- or multi-cloud solutions. 

• AI and machine learning with cloud computing

Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are the technical focal points right now. Numerous organizations are working on these two technologies. And, cloud helps in so many ways to adapt and implement them in a fairly simple way. Cloud enables users of any budget and with minimal skills to access machine learning features. Cloud also can deal with massive data sets that an ML professional needs to feed the algorithm. With AI, even without an ML model, it is possible to implement services like text analysis and machine language translation. With the cloud, AI and ML have become cost-effective, more reliable, and more productive.

• Prioritization of controlling cloud cost

The decentralized model of data consumption raised the financial burden for businesses exponentially. With the growth of cloud usage, businesses need to streamline their investment and make sure effective data utilization. With different cloud providers, the cost of cloud services and hybrid services varies to a great extent. The innovative third-party solution provider can provide solutions to choose the best and most cost-effective model for the respective organization. 

• Increased market for solution-driven vendors

Business infrastructure is on the perpetual move using SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS. While cloud providers will take care of cloud infrastructure, outsourcing will be on-demand to take care of specific needs like AI, ML, and IoT. Outsourced partners with strong knowledge of cloud computing as well as related technologies will ensure the best solution for both cloud and on-premises cases as per the organization’s requirement.  

• Progressive inclination towards tech on demand

When businesses will be able to streamline cloud expenditure, they will be left with more revenue that will encourage them to advance to solutions that beat their specific industry challenges. With cloud computing, without specialist data scientists, organizations can reap the benefits of machine learning, AI, and automation to enhance business strategies.

• Serverless computing

It is becoming increasingly popular and by 2025, 25 percent growth is expected in the serverless industry. This is highly popular among smaller organizations and start-ups. With limited resources, small-scale businesses prefer to opt for this cloud computing execution model in which the cloud provider allocates resources on-demand and takes care of servers. And, the organization only needs to worry about building and running the application. As cost is incurred based on usage, it encourages starting a business with limited resources. Moreover, the elimination of server failure ensures developers to be creative and experimental with code. 

• Edge computing

With a limited number of cloud providers, an increased number of intelligent technologies like AI and robotics, latency, bandwidth, and security issues are not uncommon. Edge computing answers these problems. Edge computing, a rising cloud trend, is a distributed computing model that brings computation and data storage closer to the sources of data by building localized data centers. This improves response time and saves bandwidth. Moreover, locally managed data ensures a higher level of security.

• Industry optimization of cloud

One of the key values of cloud providers is to offer tailored services to their consumers. However, when compared to IT industries, business sectors such as finance, healthcare, and legislation follow stricter regulations and privacy restrictions. Traditional cloud services do not comply with their data security compliances. A number of cloud vendors have addressed this challenge and started working for the optimization of their cloud capabilities to comply with the regulatory requirements of these industries. As a solution, cloud computing came up with private and hybrid cloud environments. With many such high-value industries already using these optimized cloud computing models, this trend is expected to continue.

• Disaster recovery services

With more and more organizations going for cloud-based solutions and a very limited number of cloud providers available, the occurrence and expense of downtime are expanding quickly. As a result, businesses are considering terms and strategies for the disaster recovery model. DR-as-a-Service, a technique to decrease recovery time, is increasingly becoming highly sought after.    

• Rising usage of virtual cloud desktops as workplace

The entire environment of the workstation is presented as a managed cloud service to our local workstation. This way, organizations eliminate the cost of hardware updates and maintenance. By hourly subscriptions too, the cost can be reduced. Sometimes this is called Desktop-as-a-Service, provided by AWS, Microsoft, and Google. This makes sure everyone has a synchronized updated system and security can be managed in a centralized manner. When an employee joins or leaves the company, the cost simply scales up or down. These flexibilities make this service a popular trend. 

With the exponential expansion of cloud services in businesses, it is certain that the cloud is going to rule the future. Started as an alternate storage solution, now it already offers a lot more than that. And, this trend is showing no sign of fading. Understanding the trends in cloud computing enables an organization to improve its business model and also gives an up-to-date edge to stand out among competitors.