It is no longer a question of whether companies are moving to the cloud. A few years ago, this was still unimaginable, mainly due to security concerns. Now it's just a question of when to move to the cloud and which cloud operating models to consider. Regardless of whether public, private or hybrid - the cloud plays an important or very important role for over 50% of companies in Central Europe (source: PAC CxO Survey). Cloud solutions relieve the burden on internal IT departments, are scalable and offer maximum flexibility.

Importance of the cloud for the manufacturing industry

The core of a successful cloud strategy is the flexible networking of various individual clouds to form an overall system.

© Freudenberg IT

Today, the German manufacturing industry is characterized by a very high degree of automation, which has massively boosted production efficiency in recent decades. However, there are still gaps in the integration of data flows between production and ERP systems as well as the finished products in use. This also has to do with the fact that legacy systems are still active in many places, which do their job reliably but do not have the necessary interfaces or use proprietary data formats that are difficult to integrate. Closing these gaps in the flow of data and information is an important prerequisite for digitalization - and cloud computing is a central technical basis for this. Only with an appropriately flexible, dynamic and scalable IT infrastructure can production be brought into the digital age in a reasonable amount of time.

In the cloud, capacities can be 'booked on' quickly and unbureaucratically when they are needed. Previously laborious request processes are replaced by a simple mouse click. This is particularly important because digitization processes in industry often no longer follow conventional IT project patterns, but ideas are "simply created quickly as a prototype" in order to try them out, continue them or discard them.

In addition to the many advantages - such as greater flexibility and lower operating costs - companies must not neglect the fact that cloud computing also leaves or creates new management tasks that determine the success of the operating model. New structures must be created and competencies built up for this.

Do not underestimate tasks

Where are the stumbling blocks and how can they be avoided? Freudenberg IT (FIT) and the analyst firm PAC have answered this question with the practical guide 'Mastering Cloud Complexity', which defines and examines five aspects that are crucial to the success of the cloud and provides specific recommendations for action.

Choosing the right operating model

With the growing importance of the cloud, companies must be prepared to operate several cloud models in parallel in the future. Some systems belong in the private cloud for security reasons alone, such as core applications like enterprise resource planning (ERP) or product development. Others may be in good hands in the public cloud, for example sales and marketing management or office applications. Costs can be saved by selecting the right cloud model for each use case. However, it should not be forgotten that an excessively diverse mix of concepts and service providers increases administrative costs.

Companies are therefore well advised to find the right balance between optimized individual applications and an overarching cloud infrastructure. Special cloud management and automation tools can be helpful here, as they can reduce the complexity of obtaining and using services from different operating models. By using a suitable multi-cloud orchestration platform, for example, a company can benefit from the advantages of both Amazon AWS and Microsoft Azure in its cloud architecture.

Qualification of the IT organization

It's clear that the cloud is on the rise, not least because it allows IT to be modernized and expanded without having to hire new specialists. Nevertheless, companies should bear in mind that the switch to the cloud means additional tasks for the IT organization, for which completely new expertise sometimes needs to be built up. Employees need a deep understanding of the available cloud technologies, they need to be familiar with cloud-based development tools and be familiar with the administration of cloud-based application software. It is therefore important that companies in the manufacturing industry address the qualification of their IT team at an early stage. In addition, when selecting a cloud service provider, it is important to consider what proportion of the administrative work they will take on and what the client will have to do themselves.

Security and compliance

Data security, data protection and compliance with general and company-specific rules are the cloud criteria of all. Companies cannot and should not make any compromises here. It is important: In addition to the IT security provided by the cloud provider - such as a protected data center or emergency and business continuity concepts - the company placing the order must also do its security homework, for example in the form of encrypted access between its own IT environment and the cloud. With this in mind, an intensive IT security evaluation is mandatory at the start of every cloud project. The overall system must comply with ISO 27001 (de facto standard for IT security). Even if security is an aspect that ultimately determines the feasibility of a cloud project: For many companies, moving to the cloud is a great relief from a security perspective, as competent, professional service providers can usually map this at least as well as an internal IT department.

Ordering and provision

While cloud computing eliminates the effort involved in selecting, purchasing and operating hardware and software, the effort involved in procuring and providing cloud-based services should not be underestimated. This increases with the number of cloud providers involved, for example because users and user rights then have to be assigned and managed individually. It therefore makes sense for companies to select a service provider that can handle all requirements from a single source if possible. Companies cannot devote enough attention to this point when defining their cloud strategy, because the more IT moves to the cloud, the greater the proportion of administrative work in the overall costs.

Portals for orchestration

In future, there will be no way around multi-cloud environments. And even if companies outsource the implementation of their cloud strategy, they will always rely on a mix of different operating models in order to make optimum use of investments. This leads to increasing complexity. This is why companies need the ability to manage, control and monitor their cloud landscape centrally. This allows the person responsible to see the performance of their cloud landscape at a glance and the cloud administrator to book, cancel or vary services in a targeted manner.

Cloud computing is not a solution that allows companies to get rid of all IT tasks. For sustainable success in the cloud, it is therefore important to be clear about the nature and scope of some of the new tasks and to weigh up exactly what can be outsourced and at what cost-benefit ratio. In the complex contexts of future multi-cloud environments, transparency and administrability will have a major impact on efficiency and profitability. Portals that can also be used to monitor and control large cloud environments will play a central role in this. The IT service provider FIT recognized the importance of such services for companies early on and launched a development project to create solutions for the orchestration of multi-cloud environments. As a cloud provider for medium-sized industrial companies in particular, FIT is thus taking an important step towards the future viability of the cloud in mission-critical applications and for digitalization and Industrial IoT.

Author:
Edna Lauer is responsible for the Cloud Integration division at Freudenberg IT.