The decision-makers responsible for growing businesses are faced with many challenges that keep them up at night. The fact that the business is growing is a positive development that may be accompanied by significant challenges. Successfully addressing these challenges will often determine if the prospective growth offers the organization a sustainable future.
An organization’s IT systems are crucial to its ability to survive in today’s competitive market. Growing companies need to strongly consider adopting a scalable approach to their IT environment. This article will look at the multiple benefits a growing company can enjoy by deploying a scalable IT infrastructure.
What is a Scalable IT Infrastructure?
A scalable IT infrastructure is a computing environment designed to easily handle growth and an increased demand for resources. It should also be able to reduce resource usage when demand decreases. While it is possible to construct a scalable infrastructure in an on-premises setting, we are going to concentrate on scalable solutions offered by public cloud service providers (CSPs). Most growing businesses will find going with a public CSP provides the fastest and most economical method of implementing scalable infrastructure.
The following are some of the key characteristics of a scalable IT infrastructure.
- Flexible storage – The storage capacity necessary to maintain the environment can vary widely based on a company’s fluctuating requirements. A scalable infrastructure allows an organization to add or subtract capacity to meet current needs without paying for unused resources.
- Modular architecture – Scalable environments rely on modular components that can be modified or replaced independently. CSPs may deliver applications as microservices so specific services can be scaled when necessary to meet evolving business requirements.
- Dynamic resource allocation – A scalable environment has the capability to autonomously allocate or deallocate resources based on current requirements. Computing power, network bandwidth, and storage capacity are typically managed by utilizing cloud auto-scaling features. Load balancing functionality may be included to ensure allocated resources are used efficiently to optimize workloads.
- Resiliency and availability – Data is often replicated in a scalable environment to multiple locations for enhanced resiliency. There are also failover systems in many cases to ensure availability if primary resources fail or are disrupted.
- Cost management – The scalable infrastructures provided by public CSPs typically offer cost models that only charge customers for the resources they use. A scalable environment minimizes over-provisioning and under-utilizing resources for potentially substantial cost savings.
- Robust security – A scalable environment implements security measures and controls for new resources added to the infrastructure. Customers don’t need to reinvent security solutions when expanding or contracting the environment.
Business Benefits of a Scalable IT Infrastructure
Growing companies can take advantage of many of the characteristics of scalable IT infrastructure and can enjoy substantial business benefits. These benefits contribute to a more competitive organization that can rapidly adjust to changing market trends and customer expectations. The following are some of the most impactful business benefits of a scalable environment.
Handling fluctuating capacity requirements – Growing businesses need the ability to quickly handle changing capacity requirements. Ideally, the company’s growth will be linear and consistently require additional resources. But in some cases, growth may be sporadic which can result in over-provisioning storage or computing capacity. A scalable infrastructure lets companies manage resources efficiently by minimizing waste while employing sufficient capacity to address current workloads.
Cost savings – A common characteristic of growing businesses is a desire to maximize their budgets while effectively supporting the company’s growth. A scalable infrastructure fits perfectly with this approach as it enables the organization to obtain the necessary IT resources to address its growth without breaking the bank. Taking advantage of pay-as-you-go pricing models offers companies the advantages of a cutting-edge computing environment without the capital expenditures required to implement an on-premises solution.
Improved user experience – A scalable infrastructure ensures that enough resources are always available to address the needs of the user community. This includes both internal users who need access to command systems and applications as well as external customers interacting with web-based services. Growing companies may need to rapidly add capacity or risk disappointing users by providing a degraded user experience. The scalability of a public cloud solution ensures consistent availability of sufficient resources.
Agility and flexibility – Growing companies often need to rapidly change course to address unanticipated business requirements. The ability to efficiently meet emerging demands can make a big difference in a company’s competitive standing. It allows a business to take advantage of market trends and offer targeted services to potential customers. A scalable infrastructure is key to providing the necessary level of flexibility and agility to compete in today’s business landscape.
Innovation support – The scalable environments offered by public cloud providers support innovation by making new technologies and tools available to growing businesses. Taking advantage of new technologies offers another path to improving competitiveness by furnishing innovative solutions to customers. Implementing these solutions might be impossible using a static IT environment, putting the company at a competitive disadvantage compared to other market rivals.
VAST Supports Your Scalable IT Environment
VAST has your back when it comes to designing, implementing, and supporting a scalable IT environment for your growing organization. Our technical team will work with you to determine the best path forward to create a scalable IT infrastructure that meets your business objectives. We’ll help you choose the right cloud model with our cloud infrastructure services so you maximize the value of your IT spending.
Effectively managing a scalable, cloud-based environment can be challenging and is a major factor in obtaining its potential benefits. We provide managed public cloud services that let you focus on the core aspects of your business. Our team can monitor your cloud environment and make sure it is performing up to your expectations.
We support protecting the valuable data stored in your scalable IT infrastructure with managed backups, including our Cloud Backup-as-a-Service (CBaaS) offering. Backing up to the cloud ensures you always have enough backup capacity and provides the flexibility to restore systems to alternate locations.
Get in touch with VAST today and start reaping the benefits of a scalable IT infrastructure.
