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Cloud & operations

What is cloud computing?

Cloud computing means IT delivered over the internet: servers, storage and software on a pay-as-you-go basis. Understand public, private and hybrid cloud.

In short

Cloud computing means that IT resources such as servers, storage, databases and software are delivered over the internet from large data centres, so you pay for what you use instead of owning and operating the equipment yourself.

The term covers everything from Microsoft 365 and other SaaS applications to entire server platforms from providers such as Microsoft Azure. For Danish businesses, cloud is today the starting point rather than the exception, because it removes large one-off investments and makes it easy to scale up and down as needed.

The most important points are that cloud comes in three models, public, private and hybrid, that the responsibility for security and backup remains yours even though operations sit with the provider, and that costs require active management to keep from growing. MI Support IT helps Danish SMBs choose the right cloud strategy and migrate, secure and operate the solutions in daily life.

Back to the glossary

What is cloud computing?

Cloud computing means that IT resources are delivered over the internet from professional data centres instead of from servers in your own basement room. That covers everything from computing power, storage and databases to finished applications, and you typically pay for what you use. Popularly put, the cloud is just other people's computers, but computers run at a scale, redundancy and level of security that very few companies can match themselves. Well-known examples are Microsoft 365 for email and documents and Microsoft Azure for servers and applications. Microsoft has a good introductory module on cloud computing if you want the technical foundations in place.

The three cloud types: public, private and hybrid

When people talk about cloud types, they distinguish between three models:

  • Public cloud: You share a global platform such as Azure with other customers, but your data and systems are logically separated. It offers the greatest flexibility and the lowest start-up costs, and it is where the vast majority of Danish SMBs belong.
  • Private cloud: The infrastructure is dedicated to you alone, either in your own data centre or with a hosting partner. It is typically chosen for compliance reasons, special line-of-business systems or requirements for full control.
  • Hybrid cloud: A combination, where some systems run in the public cloud and others locally or privately. It is often the reality in practice, for example when an older finance system has to stay on its own server while email and files move to the cloud.

Cloud computing vs. cloud hosting

The terms are often used interchangeably, but they do not cover the same thing. Cloud computing is the overarching term for all IT delivered as a service over the internet, including SaaS applications, development platforms and infrastructure. Cloud hosting is a subset: it is specifically about having your servers, applications or websites operated on cloud infrastructure with a provider. If you are considering moving specific servers to the cloud, cloud hosting is what you should look into, while this page covers the overall concept.

Benefits and pitfalls for Danish SMBs

The benefits are easy to see: no large server investments, access from any device, built-in scalability and always up-to-date systems. The SaaS model in particular has made professional tools accessible to even small companies. But there are pitfalls. The responsibility for data is still yours: backup, access management and security must be actively configured, because the provider secures the platform, not your use of it. Costs can grow unnoticed if no one cleans up licences and unused resources. And a cloud strategy should always address where data is stored in relation to GDPR.

How MI Support IT can help

We help Danish SMBs with the whole cloud journey: strategy and choice of model, migration of servers and data, security and ongoing operations through our cloud and hosting services and Microsoft 365 solutions. Contact us if you want to know what the cloud could concretely mean for your business.

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