Deploying and Running Enterprise Grade Applications in a Federated Cloud

Abstract

The notion of cloud computing is a paradigm shift from local machines and networks to virtualization technologies with services as a technical and business concept. This shift introduces major challenges when using cloud for deploying and running enterprise applications in the current Enterprise ecosystems. For companies, picking and choosing the right cloud to meet requirements is hard, and no solution is likely to provide the end-to-end specific IT services delivery and an end-to-end IT solution. Conversely cloud federation assists in providing flexibility to the customer and enables them to lower their TCO by shifting from one cloud to another while mitigating risks associated with a single cloud approach. In order to create competitive differentiation, small businesses require multiple software systems to both meet minimal data management and creative expectations. At the other end of the enterprise ecosystem spectrum, large companies rely on thousands of services in order to meet the needs of everything from simple departmental database applications to core Enterprise Resource planning and Customer Relationship Management systems on which the enterprise itself is managed. As an optimal adoption decision cannot be established for all individual cases, the authors propose to analyze three different use cases for deployment of enterprise applications such as SAP, on the cloud in order to provide some valuable pointers to navigate the emerging cloud ecosystem: rapid provisioning, elasticity and live migration of enterprise applications.