How you think about your next generation network infrastructure? Is it simple to deploy and scale? Does it provide clear migration paths that do not require high-impact upgrades and overnight data center work? Can it provide the flexibility to support applications across on-premises and cloud environments?
One way to help define what you need in your infrastructure is to analyze how it will actually work in your environment - from architecture design, to deployment, to operations.
Let's examine the main factors to be considered at each stage of the process.
IT architecture design
This is the time for a careful and strategic analysis of what you need today and speculate as best as possible on what you will need in the coming years.
It can be challenging because the pace of innovation has accelerated rapidly with the growth of the cloud and the expansion of technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning, which often come from the business side as initiatives with an accelerated timeline.
However, the rapid pace of innovation is here to stay, so in your architecture analysis, you must make sure that your infrastructure offers the ability to easily incorporate innovation without major impacts on the current technology architecture, and to deploy the best products when they become available.
Part of this is to ensure that you can modernize without having to go through a major upgrade every few years.
Looked at another way, what happens if your technology architecture design planning goes wrong due to items outside your control? What if the company tells you to double capacity next year compared to three years? Will that be painful?
The key consideration at this stage is precisely the architecture. In today's environment, you want simplicity, flexibility, scalability, and easy access to innovation. This requires a core alignment built around the business, which will give you maximum flexibility, where you can pay as you grow.
Any solution you choose should be simple to deploy - virtually out-of-the-box - and simple to operate, with centralized management that leverages high levels of automation and analytics.
Deployment
With proper planning, you have chosen an architectural model that will take you into the future and provide a simple path for upgrades and innovation.
Reference architectures, converged infrastructures, and hyper-converged infrastructures are designed to make it easier for IT teams to deploy solutions faster and more efficiently than traditional architecture stacks that separate the management of compute, storage, and networking resources.
You want the best of each of these models, without any trade-offs.
At this stage you want to get your applications up and running quickly and efficiently, with no downtime and with the performance and capacity required for each workload. Key features to look for include:
- Validated reference architectures that are documented and tested for a wide range of application-centric projects.
- Fast and reliable implementation using high levels of automation, analytics, and API-based integration with external systems from cloud providers and other potential partners.
- An architectural design that offers unbundled flexibility for easy expansion, giving you the ability to scale and grow based on the needs of your workloads and applications, not your infrastructure design.
What is interesting here is that the "Deployment Tax". It is not only paid on day one, but also on day 180 and day 365, i.e. any time you architect or expand a system.
Masking complex implementations is an approach that will slow innovation and add ongoing costs over time.
The operations
This is the phase that is focused on operations or "Business as Usual". For most business executives, they would like to not even think about this moment - they literally hire people to take care of everything at this stage.
Executives notice the problems in the operations phase for two main reasons: instability and inability to innovate.
If a critical service goes offline, the organization takes notice - and not in the best way. If an infrastructure requires so much day-to-day "care" that there is no budget or time for innovation, IT becomes known as the "problem department.
For the operations phase, the main factors include:
- A single-pane-of-glass management platform.
- Automated processes for day-to-day management and scaling.
- There is no need for high impact and costly upgrades.
- Architectural design around performance and reliability.
- A single source for customer support.
- Flexible deployment options, including reference architectures, managed services options, and loosely coupled infrastructure for independent scaling.
What you don't want at this stage is an infrastructure that forces you to do high-impact upgrades. Otherwise you are constantly going back to the initial stages of this process and repeating the cycle indefinitely.
The investment you make now should last a long time as the basis for your local infrastructure.
Today's infrastructure must be the foundation of your future
You should think beyond the initial implementation and make sure you have an architecture model that is easy to deploy, manage, and scale, with minimal constraints on when and how to upgrade and modernize.
Starting with an architecture in the design phase is key, but it is also important to note the other factors discussed in this article, including automation, centralized management, simplified upgrades, and reliable and consistent support from your easily accessible providers.
Contact our experts now to learn more about Aruba Networks' security, network management and connectivity solutions. We're here to help you meet the challenge.
About Conversys
Conversys IT Solutions is a provider of Information Technology and Communication services and solutions acting all over Brazil.
With a highly qualified technical and commercial team and a partner network that includes the main global technology manufacturers, Conversys IT Solutions is able to deliver customized solutions for IT Infrastructure and Telecom to its clients.
We invest in our employees and partners and strive for a long-lasting relationship with our clients, because we believe that this way we gain the skills and knowledge necessary to innovate and generate value to the businesses in which we operate.
