Cloud computing more reliable solution for businesses today: Citrix

The pandemic has led to major transformation in the way businesses are conducted. Almost everyone now has moved to cloud. The best of both worlds is what the hybrid cloud model offers you.

Vijay Jayaraman, Director, System Engineering, India & SAARC, Citrix, tells us more. Excerpts from an interview:

DQ: How is cloud computing playing a crucial role as a key IT and business enabler for 2021?

Vijay Jayaraman: Technology has been helping businesses operate for a long time now. Last year, amidst the pandemic, technology took a great leap and made business impossible without it. The world transformed the way it worked, learned, shopped, and communicated. Almost everyone moved behind a screen and took to a virtual space, and at the centre of this transformation was cloud deployment.

With employees using private resources for remote working,managing data, without compromising on security, became the prime focus of any organization. In addition to cloud models being infinitely scalable, cloud computing can be cost-effective and can provide faster time to value than traditional installations. For organizations, cloud services are ensuring business continuity by offering disaster recovery for the service as well.

These benefits, combined with the robust security solutions that come with it, have made cloud computing the easiest and more reliable solution for any business today. In fact, the cloud security market is expected to reach $18 billion by 2022, driven by the need to solve hybrid multi-cloud complexity.

DQ: What should a company adopt - public or private, or hybrid model? Is it dependant on business needs?

Vijay Jayaraman: Yes, your business requirements certainly play a key role in deciding your cloud strategy. Having the right approach in place is crucial for any digital transformation to be a success.

Higher costs, security vulnerabilities, ad-hoc adoption patterns, and overall dissatisfaction with the outcomes are just some of the downsides of shifting to cloud without a thought through plan in place.

While all cloud computing models offer common benefits like availability, elasticity, and scalability, the basic difference between a public and private cloud is that the former is owned and provided by a third party or provider for use by external companies, while the latter is owned and used by a company internally. And, the best of both worlds is what the hybrid cloud model offers you.

For organizations that are typically looking for flexibility and scalability, the hybrid and multi-cloud models are the best bet. Multi-cloud models typically co-exist with hybrid cloud and help shape the digital transformation footprint for enterprises.It also makes sense to adopt a hybrid-cloud strategy, since it can support delivery of a cloud-like experience both on and off premises.

We have seen customers move between on premises and off premises for improved response time, better end-user experience, higher app availability, better cost, and compliance. And as a pioneer of software-driven application delivery technologies, we strive to continue empowering our customers to embrace a true hybrid and multi-cloud future.

DQ: How is hybrid cloud architecture becoming mainstream in larger enterprises?

Vijay Jayaraman: Over the past year, hybrid cloud has evolved to be more than just an emerging trend. The hybrid cloud architecture now comprises of newer technologies and IT operating models being used, that are reshaping how businesses traditionally functioned. It allows businesses to share data and migrate apps between different clouds, and enables them to meld on-premises, public and private cloud capabilities.

IT teams are becoming more agile and efficient as they manage changing business needs by taking a hybrid cloud approach. Businesses with hybrid cloud architecture also have the freedom to choose the best cloud approach towards managing tasks which are increasingly important -- to runparticular workloads and manage critical application data, while keeping the overall IT costs significantly down.

With Citrix’s technology stack, our aim is to empower customers with seamless, secure, and highly productive ways to run their hybrid cloud environment. Most importantly, in today’s times, a hybrid cloud setup can effectively cater to any specific security and compliance requirements that larger enterprises may have.

DQ: What is the role of CIOs in the business’ growth story?

Vijay Jayaraman: The way businesses operate has undergone significant changes over the years. However, inrecent times, if there has been one role which has evolved tremendously, and continues to do so, it is that of a CIO. They enjoy a seat at the company’s executive table, forming an integral part of the decision-making process.

As one of the most important enablers of this current digital transformation, CIOs must work in tandem with other leaders, while inspiring, engaging, and empowering them to build an enduring collaborative business. A CIO has therefore become more of a trusted business partner for most businesses today.

Companies rely on their CIOs to look forward and outward, and invest in the right technology tools. CIOs are also key inleveraging the massive amounts of data and turning it into valuable information for the company. And because the role of a CIO has evolved beyond the technology department, theyare also responsible for building a capable team equipped tohandle day-to-day management of technology and crucial business data. Digital transformation is changing every corner of businesses globally and, as the technology continues to advance to keep up with this, so will the role of the CIO.

DQ: How is Citrix empowering IT admins to optimize their app delivery performance and security?

Vijay Jayaraman: For the past several years, the application of the cloud was limited to transitioning application workloads, and achieving greater scale, flexibility, and cost savings. When the pandemic hit, that changed. For all of us, the cloud has taken on new significance. It has become the centre of business continuity and security. Our guiding principle at Citrix has always been to provide our customers with maximum choice, so that they can opt for products and services that cater to their specific business requirements. While focusing on scale, security remains our topmost priority, so that cloud environments are as secure as on-premises.

We have the tools that can help businesses understand theirenvironment, whether it is on-premises or in the cloud.Solutions like Citrix Analytics, Autoscale, and Citrix Application Delivery Management (ADM) service, while optimizing application delivery performance and security across a hybrid-multi-cloud environment, help organizations automate and optimize cloud deployments.

They also help balance the cost and user experience. IT admins have a constant worry about securing, managing, and automating — infrastructure, application architecture, services, and others. Citrix ADM service helps them flatten these silos, through unifying app delivery and ensuring consistent visibility, automation and most importantly –security. And because it is cloud based, it is also easy to manage. At Citrix, we’ve developed and continue to focus significant investments in research and innovation to help technology leaders and IT admins pursue their unique cloud strategy with ease and confidence.

DQ: How can one enhance digital transformation?

Vijay Jayaraman: The world is moving at a fast pace, and so are consumer preferences and actions. This has led to every business reimagining their processes in a digital way and making digital transformation an integral part of their strategy. Since businesses are revolutionizing their operations and adopting emerging technologies, an internal overhaul in terms of employee experience also needs to be addressed. It's not just the customers who are demanding a digital shift, but also employees who are seeking more flexible working arrangements.

Citrix recently worked with the Economist Intelligence Unit to investigate the role technology plays in employee experience. The research showed that companies can leverage technology to deliver a great employee experience and improve employee engagement and productivity.

The success of an organization largely depends on the performance and contribution of its employees and this performance further depends on the kind of experience that the employees have while working at the organization. Hence, employee experience comes at the centre of the vision and growth of a business. Organizations should also focus on how they could make this experience more seamless for its employees so that they can effectively contribute and enhance the process of digital transformation.