Moving to the cloud isn’t the end of your cloud journey. In fact, many enterprises wind up considering adopting a multicloud or hybrid cloud approach as their cloud deployment matures.
Are you considering multicloud vs. hybrid cloud? What’s the best approach to reconcile cloud and your API strategy? How can they add value to each other?
What Is the Difference Between Multicloud and Hybrid Cloud?
The difference between multicloud and hybrid cloud is that multicloud refers to multiple cloud providers, while hybrid cloud refers to a combination of public and private clouds.
So, multicloud gives you the freedom of multiple providers instead of limiting you to one. For instance, you might have some things hosted in Microsoft Azure and some hosted in Amazon Web Services (AWS). This strategy is growing in popularity. According to Gartner, 81% of public cloud users are leverage two or more providers.
Hybrid cloud allows you to have combination of public and private clouds — but they may all be hosted by the same provider.
Back to topMulticloud vs. Hybrid Cloud: Pros and Cons
Multicloud is a good option for growing businesses that need the flexibility of cloud independence. Hybrid cloud is a good option for businesses with regulatory concerns who may need some things hosted in a public cloud — and others hosted in a hybrid cloud.
Multicloud Pros and Cons
The following table summarizes some of the biggest pros and cons of multicloud.
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Avoid vendor lock-in | More administrative burden to manage multiple cloud providers |
| Improve disaster recovery by replicating workloads across multiple cloud providers | More challenging to ensure security |
| Reduce costs by optimizing your cloud deployment based on pricing | More complicated to estimate costs of usage |
| Maximize the services of each provider | Loss of proprietary capabilities because workloads need to be portable |
So, Why Use Multicloud?
Multicloud is a smart strategy for businesses seeking cloud independence. It is especially a wise decision if your business is growing.
As your business becomes more successful and your bandwidth increases, price will vary dramatically from one cloud provider to the next. So will services.
By adopting a multicloud approach, you’ll avoid vendor lock-in and increase your flexibility. This enables you to move workloads between cloud providers to take advantage of optimal pricing and services. You can decide to host some things in AWS, some in Azure, and some in Google Cloud Provider (GCP). Plus, using a multicloud approaches offers disaster recovery benefits and easier migrations.
Hybrid Cloud Pros and Cons
The following table summarizes some of the biggest pros and cons of hybrid cloud
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Increase flexibility by scaling up or down with seasonality | More complex to maintain a private cloud |
| Improve disaster recovery by replicating workloads in public and private clouds | More bottlenecks as workloads move between clouds |
| Reduce costs by minimizing on-premises hardware | More difficult to maintain security |
| Maximize availability, especially for global companies | Less visibility into resources by separating them into public and private clouds |
| Gain full control over private cloud | Greater administrative burden |
| Comply with regulatory constraints | |
| Support hardware configurations that may not be available in the cloud | |
| Decrease latency |
Why Use Hybrid Cloud?
Hybrid cloud is a smart strategy for businesses in regulated industries.
For instance, banks are restricted by regulations for what they can put in a public cloud. By using a hybrid approach, banks can have IT infrastructure in a public cloud while complying with regulations to host core systems in a private cloud.
Back to topMulticloud or Hybrid Cloud: Why API Management Is the Key to Success
So, is multicloud or hybrid cloud better? It depends. Multicloud is better for a strategy that leverages different cloud providers in different regions. Hybrid cloud is the recommended strategy for organizations who are regulated (or have other compelling reasons to continue to host software in their own data center or private cloud).
Either way, API management is the key to your multicloud or hybrid cloud success. An API management platform allows you to create an interaction layer that decouples client applications from the complexity of the cloud landscape.
Here are some example scenarios to help you determine the best cloud strategy.
Your APIs Need to Access Systems Hosted Across Multiple Clouds
You can secure system access through an API gateway that will manage traffic regardless of cloud — or hybrid cloud / on-premises configurations. And provide a unified interface.
In this scenario with Akana, your API gateway acts as an interaction layer. It allows client applications to interact with business cloud APIs regardless of in which cloud back-end resources are hosted. These clouds may even shift, completely transparent to the client.
Your APIs Are Hosted on Different Clouds
Your APIs might also be hosted on different clouds for a variety of reasons — geographic availability, resiliency/disaster recovery, and so on.
In this scenario, you’d have API gateways installed across multiple clouds. Your business APIs would be deployed on those gateways. Clients will be directed to the gateway closest to them — or the one that is reported to be healthy. This will also be transparent to the client.
When you apply this strategy with Akana, you’ll have centralized management to create and update APIs, as well as configure security policies. This also allows you to switch APIs from one cloud to the next. And you can get centralized aggregated reports on how your APIs are doing across clouds.
You Have Workloads That Can’t Be Deployed to Public Cloud
You may be required by regulations not to deploy some workloads to a public cloud. So, you’ll need a private or on-premises option.
In this scenario with Akana, you can deploy API gateways in the cloud or on-premises. Like with the previous scenario, you’ll have centralized management and aggregated reporting.
Back to topHow Akana Helps You Evolve Your Cloud Strategy
To get the most out of your cloud strategy, an enterprise-grade API platform like Akana is indispensable. With Akana, you can optimally leverage cloud capabilities and services. And you can optimize your (API consumers’) user experience. That’s why you should use Akana as your API platform of choice for cloud deployments.
Deploy Akana to Best Fit Your Needs
Akana is cloud-agnostic, so you can deploy it to multiple cloud providers. You don’t have to limit yourself to one cloud strategy. Akana can adapt to your business needs — and enable you to adapt your strategy.
Example: Multicloud
If you’re working for a large global organization, you can’t limit your business to a single cloud provider. One geography might need to use AWS. Another might need to use GCP. By adopting a multicloud strategy, you can support both. And by using Akana, you can set up your environment in multiple cloud providers. Plus, Akana can help you switch from one cloud to another quickly.
Example: Hybrid Cloud
If you’re working for a regulated organization, there are some things you can’t host in a public cloud. By using Akana, you can leverage our SaaS public cloud. But you can also use API gateway instances in your private cloud of choice for the workloads restricted by regulations. This means all you’ll have to manage is those lightweight API gateways. Akana SaaS will manage the rest of your hybrid cloud deployment.
In fact, a large bank chose the Akana platform because of its ability to have a scalable software API gateway on premises or in the cloud.
Get Started With Akana
Find out how Akana can support your cloud strategy and help you get the most out of your deployment — whether it’s multicloud, hybrid cloud, or a hybrid multicloud.
Our experts will partner with you to develop the best cloud strategy for your business and set up Akana for success.
By using Akana, you can take advantage of the pros of multicloud or hybrid cloud — and limit the cons. Plus, you can gain cloud independence as your business grows.
Request a free 30-day trial of Akana today. Or check out a demo first and see how Akana works.