This document discusses taking a pragmatic approach to cloud strategy. It argues against extreme views that everything or nothing will move to the cloud. Instead, it advocates designing hybrid strategies that evolve over time based on an organization's unique needs and digital priorities. The document also addresses challenges around migrating applications and data to the cloud. It emphasizes that people changes during a cloud transition can be a significant barrier and that strategies should be tailored rather than copying every case study.

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The Pragmatic Cloud
Lauren E. Nelson, Principal Analyst
June 5, 2018

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“Everything will be
cheaper in the cloud”
“Cloud is only cheaper
for a few new, variable
workloads”
“Cloud is where all
my data will live”
“Nothing is
going to cloud”
“Cloud is not
suitable for my data”
“Everything is
going to cloud”
Extreme cloud thinking falls short of reality.

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Cloud is here.
$95.5B Global market for
SaaS subscriptions
76% of enterprises
consider SaaS a critical or high
priority for 2018
On average, 18% of North
American app portfolios are
SaaS today
64% of enterprises public
cloud users leverage a
standalone PaaS platform
atop a private cloud or public
cloud
69% use native public
cloud PaaS services
31% of enterprise
developers use containers
58% use public cloud
63% use private cloud
30% of workloads live in
public or private cloud today
69% of North American
enterprises consider migration
to be part of their cloud
strategy
62% use multiple public
clouds
SaaS PaaS/CaaS IaaS
Source: SaaS Adoption 2017: If You Aren't Using SaaS Broadly, Your Business Risks Falling Behind
Forrester’s Global Business Technographics Software Survey, 2017
Forrester’s Global Business Technographics Infrastructure Survey, 2017

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Vastly expanded past early use cases
• DNA sequencing
• Websites and mobile applications
• Test & dev
• New product sampling
• Short-term marketing initiatives
• High-performance computing
• Start-ups gaining low-commitment
resources
• Disaster recovery for mid-size orgs. or less
critical workloads
• Archiving or low-cost file storage
• DC migration for acquired companies
• Hybrid applications spanning edge, local,
and/or cloud
• Video streaming for millions of simultaneous
viewers
• SAP and ECM hosting
• Platform for rebuilding mainframe
applications
• Commodity outsourcing for end of life or
less critical workloads
Traditional examples Today’s examples

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• Creates innovation lab
• Rank and uniforms considered
counterproductive to DevOps
• Simple application proves multi-
million dollar savings/year
• Using PaaS to implement
process and contracting
efficiency.
• Processing data gathered by
tractors
• Launch of the “Digital Farm”
• Decision planning leveraging
data from satellite images,
crop insights, etc. to help
decide crops for season
• Royal Caribbean Cruise
Lines delivering mobile app
to avoid printing fees and
improve CX
• Built through microservices
architecture on AWS and
edge computing
• Target millennials
Exciting examples emerge every day

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Cloud migration encapsulates two concepts
• Expert that knows your application
• Platform finely tuned to support that
workload by a specialist
• Higher expected performance
• Includes a data solution
• Complete management of application
• Updates on a standard cycle
• Complete change of the application to a
microservices based architecture
• New UI and capabilities
• No app specific knowledge
• Generic platform
• Lower expected performance
• Requires you to solve for data
• Shared security and management model
• Updates not off-boarded to vendor
• Application is the same monolithic
architecture but you’re trying to run it in a
horizontally scaling world
• Same UI and end user experience
SaaS Public cloud platform (IaaS)

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56% Faster time to deploy
53% Quick and easy scaling
46% Free up admin time
44% Outsource tasks
43% Fine-grained cost control
Migrating existing application to public cloud today
31% Regulatory governance
31% Migration costs
26% Unpredictability of costs
26% Approvals from security team
26% Dev. man hours for app design
29% Security
24% Privacy
24% Network design
23% Differences btwn clouds
23% Portability btwn clouds
Perceived challenges Drivers Actual challenges
Source: Forrester’s Global Business Technographics Infrastructure Survey, 2017
Base: 680 North American and European IT
decision-makers whose cloud strategy
includes migrating existing applications to
cloud environments
TIME SPEED
AGILITY SCALE
Base: 671 North American and European
IT decision-makers whose cloud strategy
includes migrating existing applications to
cloud environments
SECURITY NETWORK
PRIVACY KNOWLEDGE
REGULATION DESIGN
COSTS APPROVALS
Base: 680 American and European IT decision-
makers whose cloud strategy includes migrating
existing applications to cloud environment

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Two concepts must blend together
NEW EXISTING
SaaS Public
Retire
Leave
as Is
Lift and
Shift
Rewrite
Hosted
Private
Public
Build
Public
Buy
Workload
Types
Modernization
Options
Destinations
Internal SaaS
Replace

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But what about
the data?

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Big data in a
public cloud is
an immediate
win

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Among big data
investors, it’s a
top priority

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The pace is
faster than
anticipated

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State of cloud data migration
• Store, process, and access
either on-premises or in a cloud
environment
• Data lakes, data warehouses,
databases
• Database engine
• Specific database technology
• Vendor supplying or supporting
that specific technology
• Method for transfer
• Management approach
• Variations between collection
methods
• Genomics
• Archiving efficiency
• AI/ML early tests
• Customer data analytics
• Oil & gas machinery and
conditions analytics
• Navigating complex CX before,
during, and after engagement
• Website and mobile app
analytics
• Real-time data collection
• Timeliness of processing
• Deletion methodology and
resiliency
• Zero-downtime
• Security and access strategy
• Identifying value of data
• Technical limitations of the
database
• Cost intensive at scale
• Anticipating evolution of the
dataset or app
• Regulation (HIPAA, GDPR, etc.)
The decisions at hand Use cases Areas for due diligence

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Wrong.
Get out in front
of your cloud
usage!

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Take a pragmatic approach to your
cloud strategy

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Hybrid-by-design Hybrid-by-accident Hybrid-by-evolution
Cloud strategies are an evolution

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You don’t need a best-in-class cloud strategy…
You need a cloud strategy that supports your
best in class digital strategy.

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Are you a unicorn?
Your strategy
should be
unique to you

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People changes are
the hardest barriers
to overcome
But don’t reinvent after every case study

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Thank you
© 2018 FORRESTER. REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED.
Lauren E. Nelson
@lauren_e_nelson
lnelson@forrester.com