Southeast Asia's digital economy is rapidly accelerating, and Indonesia is a significant part of this growth. As increased digitalization begets the demand for more data, more businesses realize the value of migrating to the cloud to scale their digital plans. 

Many Indonesian businesses (over 80 percent, according to a PwC study) have already cited the cloud's rapid scaling and on-demand self-service features as the best tool to improve operational efficiencies. Still, although the spike in cloud adoption could significantly contribute to Indonesia's digital economy, major cost inefficiencies owed to non-optimization of the cloud may negate this progress significantly and, in turn, limit the country from realizing its innately promising digital economy potential. 

Full optimization and security – the key challenges behind cloud adoption 

Optimizing the cloud is reduced costs from instances such as resource wastages or compliance risks. However, businesses may be prone to optimization failures due to employing cloud infrastructures that do not align with their internal corporate capabilities and external compliance regulations.

This failure to optimize may lead to severe repercussions in the form of cost savings losses – with studies assessing losses of up to $24 billion in cost savings from unoptimized cloud systems.

Furthermore, the consequence of an under-optimized cloud system also spills over to cloud security. This is because an unsophisticated cloud infrastructure would likely leave system gaps and vulnerabilities that make such systems prime targets for cybercrimes. To prevent these potential losses, businesses in Indonesia must be proactive in optimizing the cloud and merging security protocols with their optimization procedures.

Optimizing the cloud for efficient resource allocation & good governance

Automated real-time checks via cloud monitoring tools can enable businesses to form accurate estimations on resource quantities, such as manpower or capital, to allocate for their respective systems.

Taking a step further in allocation efficiency, businesses can also leverage monitoring software that utilizes a single, accessible portal or dashboard, helping management obtain a clearer view when understanding how to navigate through the features of their organization's cloud platform.

Additionally, establishing efficient internal controls is instrumental to optimizing the cloud, and this should ideally be done as early as the first cloud migration planning stage. This is because conducting detailed infrastructure analysis helps businesses strategize best practices compatible with their systems, especially when classifying and structuring corporate data during cloud migration. 

Following the initial cloud migration, businesses must then conduct consistent independent checks on their cloud systems during day-to-day operations, which can be done in the form of periodic audits and compliance updates.

For an even greater amount of efficiency in governance tasks, businesses can leverage automated software asset management (SAM) tools to minimize operational downtimes.

Scaling up with a multi-cloud strategy

In addition to internal checks, organizations must also consider external strategies when optimizing their cloud. In the event of business expansion, corporate data pools will concurrently increase – demanding greater scalability needs. This is where a multi-cloud strategy can come in; as a solution combining different types of cloud from multiple cloud providers, businesses can avoid the costs of potential delays from solely relying on single cloud providers.

Access to more cloud providers also helps organizations prevent stifling 'vendor lock-in" situations and enable businesses to explore more diverse price models that may benefit their budgeting. Overall, the reduction in process delays and opportunity for economic cloud purchases makes the multi-cloud strategy a holistic cloud optimization tool that businesses should consider as they experience growth. 

Boosting cloud security for greater resilience

As more businesses go digital in Indonesia, potential security breaches in data could result in wider-reaching adverse effects for business operations – just like how LinkedIn's recent cloud security breach in 2021 compromised the data of over 700 million LinkedIn users. This makes embedding security during cloud optimization essential.

To boost cloud security during optimization, businesses can opt to integrate several security features into their governance practices. For instance, businesses can embed identity and credential verification software right from the beginning of their cloud migration process to ensure that only approved individuals have access to the correct on-premises, hybrid, or public cloud resources.

To complement the monitoring system functions, businesses should include cyber security assessments in their periodic audit checks. By leveraging automated or AI-enabled security software, companies can instantly detect vulnerabilities within the cloud and deliver immediate response protocols in the event of a security breach – optimizing the cloud to be a safe data repository. 

Facilitating cloud adoption to elevate Indonesia's digital economy

In today's increasingly digitized world, the importance of the cloud cannot be emphasized enough – especially as the cloud services industry is projected to reach a massive nearly half a trillion dollars in 2022. Indonesia's position as an economic giant in Asia, with vast digital growth potential, will make it a prime contributor to the cloud industry as more local businesses are unequivocally advocating for the cloud's value as they race to meet the demands of their digitally-driven consumers.

Cloud optimization and robustly securing it will be more pertinent than ever. Not only will they assist with maximizing operational efficiency, but the cumulative benefits of cost savings and digital risk mitigation will also propel Indonesia as a leader in the global digital economy race.   

Harith Ramotheram is the chief executive officer (CEO) of Crayon Indonesia and Malaysia. Crayon is an Oslo-based multinational IT company.