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Cloud services in demand due to pandemic

Providers of cloud-based services are experiencing a steep increase in demand these days, as the COVID-19 pandemic goes global. Because of the pandemic, many employees are working from home, relying on digital productivity and collaboration tools to get their job done. What does this mean for all of us?

Even before the pandemic, many companies were already turning to online productivity and collaboration tools for their business. While projections on how long this pandemic will force people to stay in their homes vary, it is certain that for the next month or so, cloud usage will continue to rise. This has many people worried that the internet is not ready for this sudden increase in activity.

What you should and shouldn’t be concerned about

The internet’s performance depends on many things, including network infrastructure, how things are wired up, and points of presence.

  • Will the internet collapse? Experts say this is unlikely. In fact, the internet is built to survive such surges in activity.
  • Will it affect the quality of service? Yes, but it depends on the network infrastructure, the level of demand, and the ability of providers to scale up rapidly. In areas with inadequate or weak infrastructure but with a lot of users, expect to experience a slower internet because response time takes longer. But for those whose infrastructure allows them to make use of multiple paths, they can continue business as usual.
  • Can teleworking solutions cope with the demand? It depends on how capable they are of scaling horizontally; meaning, if they can distribute the load to different parts of their network. For cloud-based providers, that should not be difficult.
  • Will the increased demand mean that businesses with their data in the cloud will have a harder time retrieving their data? Businesses that use a private cloud to store their data (often for cybersecurity reasons) will not be affected because they have their own dedicated connections. But those who use the public cloud to store their data may be affected.

How companies are preparing for this surge in cloud service usage

Since the pandemic is global, all areas are affected, even those with a strong infrastructure backbone. But how they are affected varies.

  • Companies that are already using the cloud extensively are the most ready for this new normal of working from home. Having a multi-cloud infrastructure makes them even more nimble to adjust to the increase in demand.
  • Global corporations with a presence in different parts of the world, including areas with inadequate infrastructure, will experience connectivity issues. The solution is for them to redirect traffic to their areas with better-developed backbones.
  • Companies offering Unified-Communications-as-a-Service (UCaaS) and Containers-as-a-Service (CaaS) like Google, Microsoft, Zoom, 8×8, Amazon Web Services, and IBM, to name a few, need to boost their distributed capacities to accommodate the increase in telecommuting.
  • Cloud-based services are elastic, meaning they are quick to scale up or down. But the speed in which companies are able to scale up will depend on their network architecture and the kinds of services they offer.
  • Some Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) providers, like Salesforce and Dropbox, are using a data-driven approach to manage their infrastructure and internet traffic. They incorporate real-time data to determine where to route their traffic so as to decongest their system and ensure consistent and reliable performance overall.
  • The challenge is for providers to look for new and innovative ways to manage their traffic and resources. They should also look for ways to deploy new infrastructure to areas with slower, unpredictable internet service.

This work-from-home situation looks like it will last longer than just a couple of weeks. If you need help to set up your business for remote working, talk to our experts today.

Published with permission from TechAdvisory.org. Source.
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Adam

Help Desk

Adam was in the Navy before he joined our team in 2015. He is cool under pressure and a calming influence on the help desk. Perhaps this is because, after staring down Somali pirates off the coast of Africa, printer and email problems don’t seem so intimidating! Adam likes to shoot things (not people – thought we should make that clear), play Xbox, and of course, shoot things on Xbox! A husband of fourteen years with two children, he has been all over the world and still calls Central Texas his home. His teammates say, “Adam has an incredible memory when it comes to our clients. He remembers names, Internet settings, applications and printers!”
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Tyler

Projects Team Lead
Tyler cut his technological teeth through four years both in part-time work and in working with one of our telephony partners. Tyler loves working and learning, and has built a larger network at his home than 90% of our clients have in their businesses! He is thoughtful with his own money, preferring to buy a home and drive an old truck rather than pay rent and car payments. His hobbies of woodworking and gardening dovetail nicely with home ownership! He’s been known to play a bit of electric guitar, he enjoys 3D modeling and printing, and drives a gray Mustang GT that he’s modded as completely as his computers! Several of our team were in the wedding party when he got married!
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Aaron Johnstone

Help Desk Manager
With more patience than Job and more experience than most people in IT today, Aaron is the go-to guy for challenging problems. He directs our team both in the maintenance and help-desk functions. Aaron has been in IT for over twenty years and has played nearly every role possible EXCEPT, he reminds us, Sales. We can test almost every system in our client base on Aaron’s home network because it’s extensive and complex. When he isn’t tinkering with computers, he loves to read, play video games with his kids, and run. Aaron’s been married to his wife for twenty-one years and they have two daughters and a son. His teammates say, “I can always count on him to have my back. If I can’t find the answer, Aaron knows where to look!”
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Eli Meier

COO | CTO
Eli is our jack-of-all-trades. His degree is in English, and he intended to teach before he discovered a natural aptitude for computers. He combines the two in his role at Lighthouse, as he has a unique ability to explain complex technology in relatable, understandable conversation. Over more than twenty years working in IT, he’s written e-commerce programs for a university, set up an email cluster for a major league baseball team, and managed/executed hundreds of IT projects. He enjoys classic Volkswagens, cooking and barbeque, and hiking and camping. He and his wife have been married twenty-one years and have nine kids. Though he is 6’1”, he is the SHORTEST male in his entire extended family. We all feel badly for him.
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Ray Wilson

Chief Executive Officer
Ray is our CEO and he is passionate about helping businesses – both ours and our clients’ – succeed. Except for Skip, he’s probably been involved with IT longer than anyone – he was troubleshooting computers and repairing them at his school when he was seven! As an intern while attending UMHB, he was involved with IT, but really started growing when he joined our team in 2005. When he transitioned most of our clients to managed services, our MSP business was truly born, and we then grew it from five to forty people between 2006 and 2016. In that time, he was a help desk tech, business processes consultant, account manager, salesperson, sales engineer, client services manager, sales manager, and COO. If you want to get his juices flowing, challenge him to any team sport or ask him to go snow skiing. He’s been married to his high school sweetheart fourteen years and they have three high-energy boys. Oh… and both of his parents are also small business entrepreneurs.

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