Over the course of the last five years, cloud computing has done quite a lot for the development of new applications and helped transform enterprises and how they deploy their infrastructure. Today, there seems to be a consensus that the “second wave” of both public and private cloud computing services is on its way and may in fact already be happening. What can we expect? It goes without saying that large companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Google with big data centers, impressive budgets, and complex applications have a long list of expectations regarding their clouds and the budgets to support that. Are they helping to lead the charge – you bet, but it is also safe to say that regional and local web hosting and cloud hosting providers are becoming increasingly important.

Here’s a handful of predictions:

 

1.”Mega cloud providers” will rule the market

 

In less than three years the cloud server market on a global scale has increased its estimated value from around $90 billion to almost $150 billion. This growth rate continues to attract the major cloud players, such as Microsoft, IBM, Google, and Amazon and with the continued growth locally and internationally of mobile usage that growth is going to get even bigger. If we are going to describe them as “mega cloud providers,” we aren’t going to make a mistake or exaggerate a bit. Yet, there’s a catch. These big cloud providers simply won’t have the time or an economic justification to pay attention to smaller regional cloud hosting providers – many of which are helping to drive the business growth of the larger providers through managed services and cloud integrations.  Multi-cloud is fast becoming the norm. Meaning, you will have no other option than to be open to multiple cloud provider alternatives or find solutions that integrate different providers into a single panel.

 

2. Lift-and-shift cloud migration tools will come in handy

 

One of the cloud’s advantages is its elasticity. That’s the reason why many companies are eager to run their applications on public cloud systems. However, moving into a public cloud from existing legacy infrastructure or shifting between different cloud providers can be a costly operation because you must rewrite those apps to work in the new environment, while still meeting your service level requirements. That’s why lift-and-shift migration tools can particularly come in handy for both objectives accelerating the cloud migration rate and cutting the costs through the bulk application migration process.

 

3. Hyper-convergence will be a perfect match for private cloud

 

Hyper-convergence makes it possible for all integrated technologies to become one single system that is easily manageable and controllable. This is extremely important for companies that have been previously avoiding public cloud services because of potential risks or inability to avoid vendor lock-in by using third-party vendors. Switching all components into one cohesive system with the help of hyper-convergence solutions can be a win-win option for private cloud services.

 

4. The use of cloud containers will increase

 

Probably the one that we are the most excited about is containers. More and more containers are the buzz word that are helping to transform the cloud industry and what used to be something only used in non-production environments is quickly becoming the norm for leading applications and websites.  Containers are very useful for developers who are managing software codes developed especially for cloud applications. In 2017, we have every reason to believe that Linux containers will become available in almost every private and major cloud platform. You will be able to use and build your own stacks directly. These containers will be deployed broadly, which is an opportunity all cloud users shouldn’t miss or neglect.

 

5. Enterprise apps will be less afraid of public cloud

 

We can expect that companies will become more comfortable with hosting their software and applications in the public cloud environment. Security concerns will eventually have to be overcome when all benefits and advantages of public cloud providers begin contributing to overall business development and growth.