The marketplace continues to evolve and force industry leaders to embrace cloud-based solutions for their businesses. Virtualization reduces the number of servers and that further lowers operating expenses. Cloud providers collaborate and operate data centers' massive server farms and allow enterprises to outsource their IT infrastructure. However, the issue is that many enterprises are incapable of outsourcing or transit easily due to regulatory and compliance restrictions, especially for mission-critical applications.
Several vendors offer on-prem or cloud options to address these constraints while allowing users to reap maximum profits from cloud services. One of the biggest players across the industry is AWS, which provides a comprehensive cloud ecosystem to modernize all on-prem enterprises such as platforms, applications, workloads, databases and infra.
AWS has its own distinct approach on how it is stepping into the market with IaaS or hybrid implementations, focusing on secure and in-country compliant solutions in all the regions they have an established presence in.
What is AWS Outposts?
AWS Outposts is a fully managed service that brings AWS tools, services, APIs, and infrastructure to customer and client premises, enabling them to run their mission-critical apps from any location. Users can purchase a hardware rack with pre-installed AWS services. It offers two options - one that runs VMware Cloud on AWS and another that runs compute and storage on-premises, using the same APIs.
The important fact is that AWS Outposts services are interconnected with the nearest AWS region directly to deliver a seamless operational experience across on-premises and cloud environments. The Outposts infrastructure, AWS services, and updates are fully managed by AWS.
AWS Outposts allow enterprises to run AWS Outposts partners or services locally while connecting to various services available in the local AWS region. They can also run applications and workloads on-premises using a family of AWS services, tools, and APIs. The Outposts solution is designed to support workloads and devices that require low latency access to on-premises systems, local data processing, data residency, and application migration with local system interdependencies.
It is an IT-as-a-Service solution offering AWS infrastructure and select native services to a customer using AWS data center hardware, at the choice of the latter's location. This would serve as core of a private or hybrid framework for the customer. These offerings are implemented differently in terms of user management, monitoring, maintenance, and more.
Let's look at some of its services:
- Compute Services: AWS Outposts allows operations on virtual machines, Kubernetes apps, and Docker containers regionally. It provides Amazon EC2, ECS, and EKS on-premise/at preferred location. This guarantees minimal latency, steady performance, and the ability to increase computing assets as required.
- Storage Services: For on-premises usage, AWS Outposts gives measurable block storage and item storage options using Amazon EBS and S3. This makes it possible to manage and store data coherently using tools and APIs like the AWS cloud.
- Database Services: AWS Outposts assist Amazon RDS, allows on-premises categorization and administration of supportive databases like PostgreSQL, MySQL, and SQL Server may be deployed and managed on-premises.
- Analytics Services: Big sets of data can be handled using large data frameworks such as Apache Hadoop and Spark with the Amazon EMR tool. Therefore, it aids in delivering low-latency, highly mobile analytics leading to comprehensive data application.
- Networking Services: Construct separate networks and space out traffic among several targets in on-premises infrastructures with the help of Outposts' Elastic Load Balancing and Amazon VPC.
- Application Services: Outposts offer on-premises queuing and communication services by coalescing Amazon SNS and SQS. The smooth coordination of microservices and distributed applications is facilitated by these tools.
- Governance and Management Services: With on-premises installations, AWS Outposts offers CloudTrail, CloudWatch, and Config, which provide logging, monitoring, and configuration tracking. These services guarantee effective resource administration and auditing by supporting the maintenance of governance and compliance.
- Machine Learning Capabilities: Local machine learning model building, training, and implementation are possible with Amazon SageMaker on Outposts. With low latency and secure machine learning operations offered by this on-premises option, AWS's cutting-edge ML tools can be quite helpful.
There are more services that AWS Outposts offer, like machine learning, security, developer tools, end-user computing, and media services that help organizations operate their mission-critical apps without location constraints.
AWS Outposts Benefits: A Well Architected Uplift, Easy Shift for Your On-prem Infra
Reliable Hybrid Cloud Management
AWS Outposts offers similar control planes, tools, and APIs as the AWS cloud, enabling smooth hybrid cloud integration and functioning. This allows consistency and optimal performance in cloud and on-premises environments. It expedites stable management, deployment, and monitoring of applications without requiring the refactoring of current operations.
Hyper-Low Latency
AWS Outposts guarantee extremely low latency application operations, including large-frequency trading, live data analytics, and edge computing situations. For mission-critical apps, native data processing improves performance and user experience by reducing round-trip durations to the cloud.
Compliance and Data Residency
Outposts ensure that data stays on the customer's property to comply with strict data residency regulations. For businesses in regulated sectors like finance, government, and healthcare where adhering to local data regulations is mandatory, this capability is essential.
Optimal Scalability
With the on-demand scalability offered by AWS Outposts, businesses can modify their compute and storage capacity to satisfy changing caseload deliverables. This flexibility is attained without physical involvement, guaranteeing economical and efficient use of resources while preserving good availability and execution.
Advanced Security Posture
It incorporates cutting-edge features like VPC for network isolation, IAM for thin-grained access control, and KMS for encryption key management, extending AWS's comprehensive security for on-premises environment. Workloads stored on premises are safeguarded with the same precision as the ones in the AWS cloud, thanks to its extensive security strategy.
Enhanced Data Analytics
Businesses can use Apache Hadoop and Spark, as mentioned before, to handle and analyze massive amounts of data locally on Outposts using services like Amazon EMR. This leverages high-output data processing capabilities right within the on-premises environment to enable real-time insights.
Explore Amazon Web Services (AWS) Costs
Know More
How do AWS Outposts Work?
- Runs cloud infrastructures and services on-premises
Requisition and Installation
- With AWS Management Console, customers can set up AWS Outposts, transport and install the hardware on-site.
Configuration
- Customers can construct and run resources just like they would in the AWS cloud by connecting AWS Outposts to the closest AWS Region
Operation
- Using AWS tools, APIs, and services, customers process applications on AWS Outposts, which steers upgrades and maintenance.
Integration
- Through integration with AWS cloud services, AWS Outposts facilitate workload distribution and administration between cloud and on-premises systems.
Reforming IT Landscapes: Common Use Case Applications of AWS Outposts Services
Most enterprises are modernizing IT environments including hardware acquisition and management. When implementing on-premises solutions, AWS Outposts provide multiple options that enable customers to gain benefit from their existing hardware. Consider the following AWS Outposts use cases:
Hybrid Cloud Architectures
Companies combine AWS cloud services with on-premises equipment to build hybrid architectures that maximize efficiency and minimize expenses. Additionally, applications expand upon on-premises and cloud environments for scalability and reliability thanks to AWS VPC and Direct Connect. It allows strong connectivity between Outposts and AWS regions.
Edge Computing
By processing data near to the source, Outposts facilitates scenarios using edge computing. Amazon ECS and S3 are used by Internet of Things (IoTs) applications in industry and agriculture use for localized data gathering and analysis. This lowers bandwidth consumption while preserving streamlined cloud administration and insights.
Low-Latency Data Processing
Applications needing low latency can be deployed on-premises with the help of AWS Outposts. By integrating data locally and using EC2 instances and Elastic Load Balancing for live transaction management, industries such as finance decrease network latency. This is one of the very important AWS Outposts use cases.
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning
With Amazon SageMaker, AWS Outposts enables theorizing of on-premises machine learning models and training. Processing data in real-time and shortening the time duration to extract relevant insights from massive datasets is crucial for some industries. For instance, autonomous vehicles and the health industry use localized machine learning models.
Disaster Recovery
Solid disaster recovery solutions are imparted by AWS Outposts, that perpetuate concurrent duplication of vital workloads between AWS components and on-premises. Enterprises can ascertain high availability and rapid recovery for mission-critical applications by deploying AWS Backup and AWS CloudFormation.
Application Modernization
By transferring their legacy apps to containerized environments using Amazon ECS and EKS, businesses can take an advanced approach. By employing standardized AWS tools and APIs, the shift to microservice architecture is improving the scalability, dependability, and management of applications.
DevOps and CI/CD
Outposts provides AWS CodeBuild and AWS CodePipeline which are used by software developers to construct Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment pipelines locally, guaranteeing quick development and deployment cycles. This feature allows code changes to be tested and positioned in isolated settings before being pushed to cloud production.
Big Data Processing and Analytics
For local data processing, businesses use big data skeletons. Within the limitations of on-premises data governance restrictions, this configuration enables high-outturn data analytics and ETL procedures.
High-Performance Computing (HPC)
Many science and research organizations use HPC workloads for use cases such as genome arrangements and climate modelling. They may utilizethe processing capacity of EC2 instances on AWS Outposts. Researchers can meet data residency demands while obtaining prompt findings by executing these calculation-intensive processes locally.
Remote Office and Branch Office (ROBO)
AWS Outposts are used by IT companies with branch and remote offices to expand corporate IT resources and apps to remote regions. IT departments ensure dependable and protected access to company applications by maintaining uniform security and management procedures across all sites through local VPCs and IAM policies.
Explore AWS Outposts Services with Cloud4C
Companies who want to leverage cloud service benefits and prefer their apps on-premises, search for low latency, data residency and compliance, and local data processing. These businesses aim to develop all-encompassing solutions for data management across all environments and figure out how to benefit from the cloud's scalability, simplicity, and flexibility. Despite that, architecting an effective cloud strategy that addresses legacy infrastructure needs and meeting critical compliance requirements is a daunting task.
However, it's not a challenge anymore with Cloud4C, a certified AWS MSP and one of the trusted AWS implementation partners across APAC, EMEA, and the Americas. From implementation planning, installation, to modernizing legacy applications and implementing managed detection and response services for advanced security, you can trust Cloud4C to help you stack infrastructure and data security, all without requiring any support. This allows corporations to utilize the finest features of the cloud for their on-premises systems.
We are a global managed service provider that can help find the cloud environment that's right for your business needs, including AWS Outposts, a hybrid cloud-as-a-service.
Frequently Asked Questions:
-
Are AWS outposts present outside the premises?
-
AWS Outposts is a set of fully operated solutions that can be used to install AWS infrastructure and services to nearly any on-premises infrastructure or data centers, locations, and co-location areas providing a seamless hybrid experience.
-
What kind of storage do the AWS Outposts servers offer?
-
Outpost servers enable EC2 instance storage, which is block-level storage hosted on local SSD NVMe SSDs. The instance-size differs by instance kind. Instance storage is linked to the lifecycle of an instance. An EC2 instance dissipates when it is terminated.
-
What is the pricing structure in AWS Outposts?
-
The pricing of AWS Outposts consists of hardware purchases and recurring charges for AWS services. Instance types, storage choices, configuration, and service consumption all affect pricing, giving on-premises deployments variable cost control.
-
Which compliance certifications are held by AWS Outposts?
-
Several industry certifications and standards, such as ISO, HIPAA, SOC, and GDPR, are met by AWS Outposts. AWS makes sure that Outposts adhere to strict security and compliance guidelines, offering strong protection for confidential customer information. This aids businesses in fulfilling legal requirements and upholding strict security guidelines in their on-premises settings.
-
How are AWS Outposts integrated into existing IT setups?
-
AWS Outposts link to local network and the closest AWS Region to interact with existing IT architecture. With the help of this effortless integration, on-premises and cloud assets are managed together using AWS tools and APIs, guaranteeing performance, consistency, and interoperability.
