Presented by: Neil Lewis and Sylvain Gaugry from Hitachi Data Systems
The new year started off with this lively and informative talk on the topic of Cloud-based IT infrastructure and how to remain successful in a Cloud-enabled world.
As we learnt, Hitachi are positioning themselves as a leader in this field; they are making the difficult transition from selling boxes to providing services, with the whole company adapting to this disruption in their way of business.
An astounding revelation was that 90-95% of the total amount of digital data stored in the world has been created within the last two years. Another was that, by 2020, data will be created at a rate of 1.2 MB (equivalent to one old floppy disk) per second per person on the planet!
The move of IT infrastructure from self-owned hardware to multi-tenancy in the Cloud was aptly analogised to the path previously followed by electricity generation (the first all electric house had its own hydro-power generator; now we all share the supply from remote power stations).
The main benefits are:
- Powerful enterprise-grade IT is brought to the individual
- A pay-per-use charging model
- More flexibility and speed of delivery (can have a system installed within 90 days)
- The ability to fail fast; then the developer can try again, without all the repercussions.
IT has to move from the background to the forefront (not be seen as just a necessary and costly burden). It is an enabler, a leading force for digital transformation.
End users only want outcomes; they are not interested in how it is all provided. Previously the detailed design of the infrastructure was key to the purchaser.
Traditional IT cannot keep pace with the application owners; they now expect agile public cloud-like infrastructure services. They are the buyers of outside services, rather than the IT department.
Hitachi now offer a range of products, solutions and services, including "Enterprise Cloud" - a hybrid cloud solution. This provides a private cloud, pre-engineered, speedy, lower cost, SLA backed as a service, is located in the client's own data centre, gives security and data compliance.
A great example of application is News International: they buy IT capacity to match the time of day when people download the newspaper. The alternative would have been to buy enough capacity to meet the peak demand, and have it under-utilised for most of the day.
My thanks to the speakers, Neil and Sylvain, and to the organisers, Pedro Osorio and Dimitris Loumanis.
Click this link to view the presentation slides