“According to the reports by Gartner, 70% of digital transformation projects fail due to the lack of integration quality”
Today’s enterprises are built with innumerable systems and processes that help the core team function. However, these systems are not primarily in the cloud. Some are on-prem and some are in the cloud. With the pace at which the tech and digital transformations are happening, everyone’s moving to the cloud for the fact that they are significantly better and speedier. But organizations are more towards having a hybrid infrastructure with a combination of both – On-premises and cloud.
Right now, it is not about babbling whether the system, applications, and processes need to be on the cloud or on-prem, but it is all about finding a balance between them and successfully integrating the on-prem and cloud applications to leverage the optimum potential. And this can be done only when you have a befitting cloud integration tool in place, that can open doors for integrating the applications from the legacy, on-prem, or even hybrid infrastructure.
An integration platform is a set of integration tools and connectors, that help the organization interlink the apps, systems, and data across the environment.
Fundamentally, it helps organizations to develop and achieve control of the integration flows that connect various applications, services, and systems. It also helps you with API-led connectivity for hybrid integration requirements.
To connect various applications, systems, and environments in the cloud, cloud integration is used! It helps break the data silos by unifying disparate systems while streamlining the business processes.
A cloud integration platform or the integration platform as a service (iPaaS) helps you integrate all your local files, data, and on-prem applications with a cloud-hosted platform or a system. When you have a proper integration in place, this iPaaS enables connectivity between the on-prem legacy environment and the modern cloud-based applications for delivering business value.
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Let us now understand the differences between on-prem and cloud integration.
On-Premises VS Cloud Integration – The differences
| On–Premise |
Features |
Cloud |
| Upfront investment, a huge amount for hardware, servers, IT maintenance, and setup |
Cost/Pricing |
Low-cost up front, no hardware investment with predictable cost throughout |
| Time-consuming implementation, and adding users and instances are too expensive |
Setup/Deployment |
Quick and easy implementation, and adding users and instances is easy and simple |
| Reduced stability, fragile integration and prone to break when there are software updates from the vendor |
Customization |
Great consistency, stability and more vendor support for customization |
| Maintain your own servers, and perform all your updates and patch works yourself |
Maintenance |
The servers and hardware are taken care of by vendors. Updates, patches and fixes are done automatically |
| You have to take measures to avoid data breaches and server failures |
Security and Disaster recovery |
Security and backup are taken care of by the vendors |
| For smaller organizations with legacy infrastructure |
Usability |
For growing enterprises with cutting-edge, present-day needs |
The above table speaks it all. Having the on-prem cloud integration solutions will make everything messy and cumbersome. When technology is moving forward, it is imperative to move your business too and push it ahead of time. With an on-prem, after a period of time, you are definitely going to lag if not immediately.
It is “Better now than later” – better to move to cloud now, than later as it’d be considerably easier now than later.
The benefits of having an on-premises integration infrastructure
More than 85% of organizations will embrace a cloud-first technology by 2025 – Gartner
With this massive number, you must now be able to comprehend why people are thronging to the cloud. There must be some significant business benefit or advantage for which, a majority of the organizations are embracing cloud over on-prem integration solutions.
Let’s dive deeper and explore the cloud integration benefits.
Cost and the pricing
The table mentioned above gives clarity on where you’d spend and the places you will save huge costs when it comes to cloud integration solutions. However, when you have a growing on-prem organization, you’ll hardly save and there will certainly be more cost spent than ever.
Setup/Deployment
On-prem integration is always a time-consuming process because of the fact that everything needs to be installed manually on a physical server. But when it comes to cloud implementation and deployment, the iPaaS platforms have everything ready and you just need minimal configuration and you are good to go.
Efficiency
Since the processes and the applications along with the systems are integrated into the cloud, you can spend less time searching and more time working on the crucial aspect of your business. The processes are automated and hence require minimal human intervention to get the redundant tasks. Along with this, you will experience increased productivity and huge cost savings, as it is less probable that you will ever have to encounter any downtime or errors.
Scalability and flexibility
When you have an established enterprise demanding numerous integrations, with the cloud, you can scale faster and it is comparatively easier in the cloud. They are flexible and can stretch with various features or connectors to meet your business needs.
Accessibility & visibility
Fetching files and data from cloud storage is just a click away. Since everything is stored in a single platform, users can easily find what they are looking for when they have access. This promotes visibility, eliminates data silos, with efficient internal team collaboration.
Data loss prevention
When you have the on-prem solutions, there are more chances that your physical machines might face errors or downtime and you might lose the data too. But, in the cloud integration solution, all your data is stored in the cloud. So, there is no worry about any data loss as everything is safe and secure.
Competitive and way ahead in the market
It is no doubt that companies that embrace the cloud will be the leaders. Cloud solutions will be soon the standard solution and companies that embrace the cloud faster will be leading the market with a competitive edge over other companies with on-prem integration solutions.
Security and disaster recovery
When your team is busy with the business process and stuff, who will manage the security issues and take responsibility with the on-prem integration solutions? Well, when you have cloud integration solutions, you can be least bothered as everything will be managed by the vendor itself. Moreover, all your data is saved in the cloud, with 24/7 monitoring, and you can back it up whenever necessary.
Whether your company runs on-prem or cloud or you wish to have a hybrid solution, we can help you with all the integrations seamlessly. Furthermore, you can pick up the best iPaaS platforms for your business and we’ll get everything done for you.
