Hybrid Networking: The Best of Both Worlds

With the enterprise going mobile and global, significant changes are happening in the way we work and communicate.  Applications no longer reside exclusively in the data center, and workloads are moving from enterprise data centers to private and public cloud. Workers no longer sit in the same office and are relying on new Internet-based collaboration tools which were never available.

These changes are challenging organizations to change faster than many can respond. Companies are looking to improve the end user experience and keep it predictable and consistent while keeping their costs in control. They are also looking for improved application performance, replacing expensive private networks or outsourcing the management of the network for cost control, gain better visibility and control over multiple network technologies within their network.

Legacy infrastructure was designed and installed before cloud, enterprise mobility, and collaboration became the new normal and therefore can’t meet the needs for speed or space demanded by today’s global workforce. As a result, businesses face challenges in optimizing business-critical applications and controlling telecommunications costs.

(Image: Nattapol Sritongcom/Shutterstock)

Simply put, a traditional private WAN is too inflexible and expensive for the cloud, while the public Internet can’t meet businesses’ demands for secure, reliable performance. For that reason, hybrid networks are becoming more prevalent. With a strong network underpinning a cloud platform, a hybrid model can address your security and compliance concerns but also simplify your IT infrastructure management.  A hybrid network provides the reliability and security of a private network, with the scalability and cost-effectiveness of the public Internet. It’s a best of both worlds situation.

Let’s look at an example in the retail space. Tal Apparel, one of the world’s largest clothing manufacturers, was experiencing bottlenecks in its computer systems, with frequent downtime. Lack of capacity resulted in slow batch routines, and backups were another headache, taking many hours.In just six weeks, the team implemented a fully managed, 24/7/365 hybrid cloud platform. As part of a lift-and-shift deployment process, eight terabytes of data were physically transferred from Tal Apparel to the new hybrid cloud system. To address the backup problem, the team restructured and deduped the Tal Apparel data. A second copy of the data was transmitted to the Hong Kong data center for disaster recovery. The new set-up ensures application availability while freeing up IT staff in both Tal Apparel and Infor, allows them to reach out to customers with a compelling one-stop cloud shop, anywhere on the planet.

The numbers behind the benefits of hybrid models speak for themselves. For example, Telecom Services provider Client Instant Access implemented a hybrid network model, eliminating the need to maintain physical servers and data centers. The result: an almost 20% increase in usage in the quarter following the deployment. And, the company now needs to spend a lot less time on troubleshooting issues, allowing it to focus its efforts on adding value for its customers instead.

It’s not just the technology sector that’s undergoing a “hybrid” transformation. The increasingly mixed world of networking is similar to the diversification and changes we’re seeing in the television industry today.  Consumers viewing habits have changed drastically. More people than ever before are subscribing to streaming platforms like Netflix and, for the first time in recent years, cable TV subscriptions are declining.  Consumers’ demand for content and flexibility of choice is driving these changes.  Similarly, enterprise demand for digital infrastructure that provides efficiency, flexibility, scalability and cost predictability across multiple geographies and environments is driving the move to hybrid models.

In today’s digital world, hybrid networking can help your infrastructure stay agile, grow your business across the globe, optimize cloud deployment and enable innovative services. Whether you expand into new geographies, add capacity requirements or optimize your cloud deployment digital Infrastructure provides ubiquitous access to data and enables the ability to communicate and collaborate seamlessly worldwide.