Running a business that relies on technology can become quite costly when it’s time to expand. The costs of purchasing extra hardware may put a strain on your budget. However, did you know that there are other alternatives? As cloud computing becomes more popular, many businesses are switching to virtualization to save on costs and improve efficiency.
What Is Virtualization
Virtualization is the technology that allows users to perform certain actions in a virtualized environment. For example, by virtualizing your servers, storage, network, or applications, you can have access to the same functionalities without having to be physically near the hardware. It’s said to be the most effective way to help companies cut down IT expenses, boost efficiency and move towards an agile business model.
Benefits of Virtualization
Improved Server Efficiency
The ability to scale up and down according to business needs enables you to save on computing resources. Not only that, you’ll see a significant drop in energy and cooling expenses when virtualization is implemented. Since it keeps energy consumption down, virtualization is also an eco-friendly solution for businesses that care about the environment.
Remote Working Made Possible
Since your employees don’t need to have physical access to the hardware to do the work, they can virtually work anywhere. If the recent buzz about remote working and globalization of the workforce has captivated you, virtualization provides you the technology necessary to make it happen within the organization.
Faster Disaster Recovery
Disaster and unexpected events can happen anytime. That’s why having a business recovery plan is critical to your long-term success. Did you know that about 40 to 60% of all businesses failed to reopen after experiencing a disaster?
Virtualization allows you to easily back up all data and restore it whenever necessary. This way, when disaster strikes, you don’t have to worry about losing all your valuable data and can redeploy everything in a timely manner. Downtime will be minimized so that customers are least affected by the adverse event.
Faster Deployment for the IT Team
If your business is technology-based, virtualization will make your IT team’s job easier. They no longer need to spend time and effort configuring new hardware for testing purposes. With just a few clicks of a button, a replica of the current system is up and running. Technologies like Docker and VMware have made it simple and efficient to launch as many virtual machines as you like. Each operates independently from one another. This is especially useful when the team needs to test a piece of software on different platforms.
Seamless Migration to the Cloud
When you virtualize, you are one step closer to embracing the power of the cloud. Virtualization makes it much simpler to perform cloud migration later on because a virtualized infrastructure already resembles that of a cloud strategy.
Reduce Your Security Costs
Malware and viruses pose a real threat to all businesses in any area. Not only that, hackers especially target businesses because of the potential monetary value they can extract from those businesses. To keep your business safe, you need a proper security plan. The cost of such a plan rises in accordant with the number of machines you need to protect. Fortunately for you, virtualization helps cut these costs down as you can easily implement all security measures on one main system and replicate them across the network. Maintaining and upgrading become less labor-intensive as well.
If you have been experiencing growth in your business, it’s a sensible choice to opt for virtualization. Just starting out? Virtualization will help you stay on a budget. Contact us today if you are interested in knowing what virtualization can do for your business.
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