Cloud

“Cloud Computing” is perhaps one of the most overused buzzwords out there – all it really means, is your computing power and services live somewhere else, accessed over the internet

Instead of that pesky, dust ridden, noise & heat generating server in the corner (on-premises), it’s in a proper home – complete with air conditioning, backup power and replicated so if the server that has your stuff breaks, another one takes over instantly.

This brings huge advantages – both in cost (cloud expenditure is a monthly expenditure, not a huge capital expenditure like servers used to be) and management – you don’t need an IT geek sat in your office in case it breaks. You also don’t need to be changing backup tapes every day and you don’t need to plan capital expenditure to replace your servers.

Connect Cloud

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We think our customers are pretty special people, and as a result, we’ve got a Private Cloud especially for them! That’s resources that are dedicated to our customers rather than shared between 1000’s of people. This has the great advantage that each server gets personally hugged by our team every day, to keep it happy and performing well (no extra charges for hugs).

Our private cloud powers all our computing services, and, it’s often used by our customers when they need to be absolutely 100% sure as to where their data is (GDPR and all that jazz – no jazz hands please); or to provide resources and services that’s just not possible or advisable in Public Clouds. With our private cloud, those legacy applications, like the billing system from 1990 that still needs to be kept working can be migrated into our cloud like for like. Not just because of Brexit, or the uncertainty over future Data Protection arrangements, but also to support local businesses like our ourselves – Our Private Cloud is solely based in the UK.

our private cloud

What’s Public Cloud?
What’s Hybrid Cloud?

Public Cloud is where services are offered by third-parties over the internet, and resources shared between thousands of customers. It has the advantages of being scalable on a pay-per-use basis – supporting that spike of web traffic for 2 hours is totally possible with the public cloud and elastic (not like those waistlines we might add) computing. It can be deployed extremely fast (within minutes) for as little as an hour.

Public Cloud also has huge advantages for the non-profit sector, for instance, Microsoft give $5000 of Azure credits each year to most Registered Charities, meaning instead of a server paid for, it often becomes free.

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Hybrid Cloud is kind of a mix of everything, on-premises, private and public cloud and is one of the great ways of utilising the advantages of each whilst reducing the drawbacks. For instance, keeping the “absolute confidential” data onsite and in your physical control, the “still confidential but not likely for anyone to be shot” data in a private cloud, and the public data in a Public Cloud. The services you have, and the data you’ve got, totally drive this type of decision.

We’ve completed many different projects where these concerns exist, and we have leveraged the power of these three approaches to achieve benefits for our clients. If you’re nervous about a whole cloud migration, but want some services, talk to us today.