Cloud – Native Applications and Architecture are Becoming a Business Imperative

Recently, Couchbase and Tech Data announced a collaboration that would promote the expansion of the cloud-native database industry in the ASEAN area. Through the partnership, Couchbase hopes to strengthen its footprint in ASEAN and promote Capella, a distributed NoSQL database offered as a fully managed service.

CIO World Asia spoke with Bennett Wong, Vice President, Advanced Solutions – Modern Data Centre Analytics, Tech Data APAC about cloud-native applications and architecture becoming a business imperative rather than a competitive edge.

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Cloud – native applications and architecture being a business imperative

Many of the fundamental principles of digital transformation were shaken by the pandemic, prompting many organizations to accelerate their digitalization processes. From a technological perspective, organizations must take into account a variety of factors in the current environment, including integrating a hyperscaler environment, utilizing Software as a Service (SaaS), and supporting current on-premise technologies. From a commercial standpoint, organizations would want to invest in scalable technology that is autonomous, adaptable, and usable in many settings. This is where cloud-native apps and architecture enter the picture. The idea behind them is to make use of the size, accessibility, flexibility, and resilience that cloud-hosting architecture provides.

Other factors contributing to enterprises’ growing reliance on cloud-native solutions are speed and agility. When using a cloud-native application, the underlying platform might be in either an on-premises or a cloud environment (whether public, private, hybrid or multi). As opposed to depending on outdated platforms, this allows operators the flexibility to go to market (GTM) significantly faster. Cloud-native design also makes it easier for different IT teams to collaborate more quickly, which speeds up deployment.

Cloud-native architectures are increasingly assisting organizations in their modernization initiatives, whether it is through cost effectiveness, improved customer experience, adaptability and scalability, automation and flexibility, portability, greater security, or simplicity of management.

Benefits of adopting cloud – native architectures

Businesses using cloud-native architecture should anticipate faster GTM and application releases along with automated issue fixes via a continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipeline. In a cloud-native design, automation is key to preventing possible downtime and human mistake.

Before investing in cloud – native architectures

Organizations should plan and estimate the real cost of migration activities and the return on investment on services used in the long run before investing in a cloud-native architecture. This may support organizations in their choice to adopt a cloud-native architecture.

Before making a transition, it’s always a good idea to assess and understand the current pain points. From a technological perspective, you should also consider whether releasing the application code will present any difficulties and how long each release will take, as well as how long the downtime will last. For instance, before you can deploy apps to a company’s multiple-cloud environment, you must provide for each environment separately.

Trends in the cloud – native database market in ASEAN

A boom in demand for cloud-native designs is anticipated in the Asia Pacific (APAC) region since they are seen to be the best for maximizing the advantages of the cloud computing delivery paradigm. In APAC, the market for cloud-native storage is anticipated to increase at 23.2% CAGR over the course of the projected period (2022-2028).

An organization’s ability to manage the changing business environment is made possible by cloud-native application architecture. Serverless computing and containers are two of the main developments in cloud-native technology. The lifespan of a program can be simplified with containerization in a cloud-native environment, but serverless computing’s advancement and containerization’s advantages provide a far superior value-add.

The usage of multi-cloud, also known as distributed cloud, which entails information architectures that let the simultaneous use of the infrastructures of different cloud providers, is also gaining popularity.

Infrastructure as Code (IaC), which increases the functionality of cloud-native apps by enabling IT infrastructure provisioning automation and so lessening developers’ workload, is another development to keep an eye on.

Microservices architecture is needed to simplify product development and make services independent in order to modernize cloud-native systems, which requires making the development cycle agile and scalable. With the use of cloud-native apps and microservices on the increase, service mesh technology is quickly becoming a fundamental component.

The partnership between Tech Data and Couchbase

Through this collaboration, Tech Data will be able to offer specialized expertise and solutions to streamline Couchbase’s cloud service delivery so that developers may create robust, cutting-edge apps.

In addition to having access to the solutions needed to construct a cloud-native application, but also have the capacity to assemble every component of the solutions under a single roof. Tech Data has the knowledge and access to solutions like container platforms (Red Hat), CI/CD and automation (GitLab), enterprise and hybrid infrastructure (Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services), all of which are required to build and support a well-rounded cloud architecture, in addition to distributed databases from Couchbase.

Tech Data can spread Couchbase’s messaging in a more intelligent way throughout the four nations thanks to its broad reach throughout Southeast Asia and its skills. The exact same cloud-native approach cannot be deployed by any customer in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, or Vietnam from a business perspective. After all, clients in Southeast Asia have a wide range of requirements and skill sets, making the region’s market heterogeneous. In addition, each of the four nations is at a distinct level of its IT transition.

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