Digital adoption clouds blow towards Thailand and Singapore
US cloud firm predicts shift to the ‘hybrid’ cloud which bridges benefits of private and public cloud models
By Suchit Leesa-nguansuk
The Internet of Things (IoT) and digital transformation have driven the adoption of cloud computing technology in business organisations, says a US-based enterprise cloud infrastructure firm Nutanix.
“Thailand and Singapore are the top two strategic countries in the Asean market that can leapfrog the adoption of private cloud data centres,” said Sudheesh Nair, president of Nutanix.
Compared to Europe and the US where the enterprise infrastructure has been established, Asian countries have more greenfield that offer potential for investing to virtualise enterprise data centres, said Mr Nair. This strategy makes it easier to migrate to cloud-based data centres, similar to when telecom systems in Asia jumped from landlines to wireless systems.
“The enterprise infrastructure in the US and Europe is established and they will take a bit longer to adopt for new technologies,” he said.
Businesses need more agility in their IT infrastructure and they need to speed up their time to market with a lower cost of investment, said Mr Nair. These factors should stimulate the growth of cloud technology adoption.
Nutanix predicts a shift from the present data centre model to the hybrid cloud where core business applications and predictable workloads will be run in a private cloud environment and seasonal or unpredictable workloads can function on the public cloud.
The hybrid cloud bridges the benefits of private and public cloud, as private cloud will serve the secured and controllable functions with customisation for the financial and healthcare sectors, while the public cloud will better serve those who deal with peak workloads.
He said the proliferation of the IoT will change the cloud industry as IoT devices become extensions of cloud data centres. To capitalise on this opportunity, the company wants the industry to adopt an “open cloud” environment by embedding its cloud OS with IoT hardware partners.
“The IoT with Nutanix OS will enable devices to make decisions faster,” said Mr Nair. This works well for time-sensitive applications such as in an emergency ambulance, car accident detection systems, or for security or defence.
Industries including healthcare, finance, government, oil and gas, agriculture and automotive will benefit from this trend.
Nutanix provides Amazon Web Services private cloud data centre technology including enterprise data centres.
By 2025, businesses can automate migrated applications and diffuse data in different types of cloud with one click, he said. The global cloud industry is projected to shift from multi-cloud to a hybrid cloud environment.
Thawipong Anotaisinthawee, country manager of Nutanix (Thailand), said its local sales increased by triple digits each year the past three years because of increasing demand in the banking, telecom and government sectors.