Subscribe

Open source boosts cloud innovations

Admire Moyo
By Admire Moyo
Johannesburg, 03 Apr 2014

Open source technologies ensure that organisations moving to cloud computing boost their innovation capabilities.

That's according to Michel Isnard, VP southern Europe, Middle East and Africa, Red Hat. In an interview with ITWeb, Isnard noted that most of the cloud infrastructures in the world are open source.

"Most public clouds in the world are based on open source technology. If you talk about Amazon Web Services, Salesforce and plenty of others, they are all using open source technology," said Isnard.

"When you think in terms of cloud, what you have in mind is 'I need to be extremely reactive and innovative to competitive situations'. This means you need to have a technology that is extremely open for innovation," he said.

Open source is the place for innovation and when it is delivered in the cloud, this is exactly what businesses are looking for," Isnard added.

To him, open source technology is also "extremely" solid. "Because we have certified our software on standard hardware platforms - X86 - we don't have any scalability issues, which is one of the biggest advantages of cloud computing," he explained.

The other major reason for open source being a strong vector for cloud development is because of costs, he pointed out.

"Acquiring an open source solution for an enterprise, from an investment standpoint, is much more affordable than any proprietary software solution.

"When you think of cloud again; you think about freedom and this is exactly what open source is about," he said, adding that open source is about giving back to end-users full control of the IT and infrastructure.

"Organisations don't have this control when they are locked in to a propriety software solution. If you are dependent on your vendor for innovation, it means you are not in control. Businesses must be free to decide."

In a recent white paper, Red Hat says just like IT in general, cloud implementations are increasingly hybrid.

Furthermore, it says, spanning heterogeneous infrastructures, supporting multi-vendor environments and bridging existing business workflows to this hybrid cloud world requires open approaches - including, but not limited to, open source - just as leading public clouds have done, it adds.

But within this broad open and hybrid framework, there's also a need to take into account the specific needs of each individual business.