As tech sectors in Southeast Asia continue to flourish, cloud technology has been another growth market this year, making up 85% of all IT and business services across the region. Tech startups and cloud services both became areas of focus, even attracting attention from investors all over the world.
As cloud trends in Southeast Asia emerge into the spotlight, many of the region’s startups are taking full advantage of the numerous benefits the computing ecosystem brings.
Cloud protects computing infrastructure
Because cloud services do not run out of a single data centre, it minimises the risk of the computing infrastructure ever suffering an outage or falling victim to DDoS attacks. For example, a server in your infrastructure may be physically located in a data centre in Singapore while another server runs in tandem with it in Hong Kong.
In a multi-cloud era, data privacy will be the top priority for startups in Southeast Asia
If one of these goes down for any reason, an alternate server can be brought online in the locations that are still running smoothly with almost no noticeable outage. This allows you to have an extremely robust infrastructure both on the customer and the core side of things.
Cloud caters to specific business needs
Most cloud service providers allow businesses to create their own service plans. Companies that use Amazon’s cloud service AWS to set up their infrastructure can control everything about their servers. This allows them to manage the number of individual cores, the amount of memory and storage and even choose from a large variety of operating systems—one of the huge benefits of using cloud-based technologies and creating an ecosystem in the cloud.
When a company wants to create a new server for testing or to run a new aspect of the business, they don’t need to waste time creating a new Virtual Machine (VM) or building a new physical server. They can use the AWS portal to spin up a new server that meets their exact requirements in minutes. This is especially useful for a new startup as they can spin up cutting edge infrastructure for a fraction of the purchase price of the actual servers allowing new businesses to use technology that rivals that of giant corporations.
Rise of cloud in Southeast Asia
The cloud services sector has been a massive growth area in Southeast Asia, especially in Singapore, where almost nine out of ten companies use cloud-based services. This growth increased dramatically during Covid with over 70% of companies relying more on cloud services to run their businesses.
Some huge businesses have recognised this growth and are investing heavily in it as the sector evolves and develops. With companies such as Facebook investing $1 billion USD in a data centre in Singapore and thanks to other countries in Southeast Asia improving their digital infrastructures, the amount of companies using cloud services in the region is sure to grow exponentially in the coming decade. As the service providers expand and grow in the region, there will be an increase in opportunities available to all SMEs to use the cloud in a myriad of ways. This access to cloud computing will allow them to operate on a higher level at a fraction of the cost.
How cloud makes compliance easy
All businesses need a “system of agreement” to function, and for startups, these must be appropriately integrated into all existing systems from CRM to HCM or any other applications used by the company. Thanks to the cloud, there is significantly less double handling required, and all the necessary workflows for these systems to work can be streamlined into one smooth process. It can even be taken a step further and integrated directly into applications employees use daily, making it as seamless as possible and improving productivity and employee experience.
With these agreements, it’s significantly easier to store and track and audit any documents and their paper trail, as every edit, copy, and version of the file is logged in the system. This will make it easier for a company to keep track of what’s going on internally, and it will also reassure a customer base that everything is correctly run within the business.
With every startup needing a digital footprint to make a mark and attract customers, clever use of cloud services can help them achieve this more easily and smoothly. The relationship between tech startups and cloud services is fast becoming symbiotic and will undoubtedly continue to grow for the foreseeable future.
By using the modularity of cloud services to grow their business, tech startups will save immensely on their operational costs while also streamlining their workflows. This will allow for a more positive work environment, increasing worker productivity. As cloud trends in Southeast Asia continue to develop, startups must find ways to use the cloud to help their company grow.