Cloud islands threaten take-up rates: CA
Cloud providers are heading for a dry spell unless they let go of proprietary systems and adopt open standards to allow interoperability, according to CA Technologies director of security business, Matthew Gardiner.
In an interview with ZDNet Australia, Gardiner said that consumers and cloud providers often make the assumption that when migrating to the cloud, all existing architecture will be wiped away and replaced.
"Microsoft used to have this position — if everyone just used Microsoft, then all of these interoperability issues would go away," he said.
However, he said that this approach was incorrect, especially when migrating to the cloud, as no business uses a single provider for all of its systems. This leaves businesses with a mix of systems that may not necessarily be compatible with each other.
"An enterprise will have dozens or hundreds of [systems] and so they [cloud providers] have to come to terms with making their management and security interoperable with those of the enterprise and other cloud services," he said. "I don't think that cloud providers as a group have come across and figured that out yet."
Gardiner said that although there are certainly a number of highly successful cloud providers, the industry is already starting to see consumers become more hesitant to move its more critical applications to the cloud as providers fail to work with each other to address interoperability issues.
"While the market has a lot of heat in it, I think there's an adoption stall coming where a lot of companies are doing a little bit in the cloud, but not many companies are doing a lot," he said.
He did admit that some providers are moving towards standards-based interfaces, but he said that the industry still had a fair way to go while other providers catch up.
"The cloud providers will change and recognise that it's a joint responsibility, and they'll open their system up to appropriate security and management, but I'd like to avoid the constipation, if you will, and get through it."