Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) is a cloud computing service that provides access to IT infrastructures such as virtual machines, servers, networks, and storage resources for computing services per the requirement, on a pay-as-you-go basis. The Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) is also called Hardware as a Service (HaaS). Enterprises use IaaS for testing and development, web apps, backup and recovery, extensive data analysis, etc.

In traditional services, the infrastructure was hosted with a fixed hardware configuration for a specific period. The client needs to pay a fixed amount for the configuration and time rather than the actual use of resources. Now with Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) platform, clients can configure resources dynamically and only need to pay for the number of services used. IaaS can be scaled up and down as per the customer requirement, and it provides guaranteed service-level agreement (SLA) in terms of uptime and performance.

The IaaS offers services:

• Load balancers
• IP addresses
• Virtual Machine disk storage
• Software bundles
• Virtual local area networks (VLANs)

Many IaaS providers include Amazon Web Services, Tata Communications, Rackspace, Netmagic solutions, Reliance Communication, Sify Technologies, etc. 

Benefits of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS)

1. Pay-as-you-Go: IaaS does not require upfront fees. The user needs to pay only for what they have used.
2. Scalability: Customers can quickly scale up and down the resources per their requirements.
3. Continuity and Disaster Recovery: The data are replicated and stored in a different locations, so accessing the application and data during disasters and outages is easy.
4. Core Focus: The Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) focuses on core business instead of IT infrastructure and computing resources.

Disadvantages of Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS)

1. Security: In an IaaS environment, security is a big issue. Many providers are not able to provide highly secure infrastructure.
2. Interoperability Issues: Customers cannot migrate Virtual Machines from one service provider to another,r so they may face provider lock-in issues.
3. Data Erase Practice: The customer uses a virtual machine, a shared disk resource provided by the service provider. Once the customer leaves the resource, the cloud provider should ensure to erase all the data from that resource before assigning that resource to another customer, so that customer may not get any data residue from the previous client.