Cloud Delivery Models

Cloud Delivery Models: "In the early days of IT, "delivery" meant something very different than it does today. Back then, in response to a purchase order, delivery meant that a lot of computers and related hardware would show up one day on the loading dock of the customer. After that it was often anyone's guess what would happen next.

Ideally, of course, all those computers would eventually be connected, and would provide IT services to the customer.

Today, IT customers expect something very different when we talk about delivery. In the age of cloud computing, customers have the option of jumping right to IT service delivery, and no longer worry about all the intermediate steps required in an earlier time.

Cloud computing offers three distinct delivery models to reach this goal, depending on the needs of the customer: private cloud, public cloud or hybrid cloud. As the name suggests, a private cloud is contained within the firewalled customer IT environment. Here the customer has all the capabilities of cloud computing-rapid service provisioning, elasticity of compute resources, unsurpassed network latency, and higher asset utilization. The customer can also implement any security and compliance policies that may be required for their confidential or sensitive applications or data. Human resources and financial data analysis typically have good synergy with this cloud model.

The public cloud provides elastic IT resources as a service on the internet in the pay-by-the-drink "op-ex" model, which essentially eliminates capital expenditure ("cap-ex"), as well as the need to plan ahead. In the public cloud model, massive array of resources could be deployed in minutes and vacated just as quickly. Unlike the private cloud, however, there is less customization possible and the menu of services offered is often limited. Public clouds are frequently used for one-time processing of non-critical data and content hosting with unpredictable traffic demands.


Finally, hybrid clouds are environments that live outside the corporate firewall, yet offer an added degree of security that isolates customer networks from one another. While inherently less flexible than the private cloud, a hybrid cloud offers the compelling cost model that nears that of a public cloud, and can be used for time-sensitive spill-over loads that a private cloud cannot accommodate. The IBM Smart Business Development and Test on the IBM Cloud beta is a public cloud today but will soon offer hybrid cloud features.

Public, private or hybrid. Whether using one or several of these cloud models in the enterprise, customers can realize significant cost and time savings over earlier IT delivery models, including the painful “drop ship” delivery method of an earlier time.

For more information, visit www.ibm.com/cloud"