How Google Cloud Anthos is breaking the multi-cloud barrier
Here is a look at the biggest takeaways

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From Google Cloud to G-Suite and Chrome, Google Cloud Next 2019 was about utilizing data in the most intelligent ways possible.

With presentations and keynotes that focused on the themes of innovation, scalability, and security, there was a lot to take away from this conference. However, three offerings managed to stand out among the rest.

Here is a look at the biggest takeaways from Google Cloud Next 2019.

Anthos steals the show

Google isn’t concerned with customers deploying and managing applications on AWS and Azure. In fact, it’s making it easier to do so with the announcement of Anthos, a new hybrid cloud solution.

Anthos is a service that runs on Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) and allows migration of virtual machines (VMs) from on-prem to other clouds directly in Kubernetes containers. But it doesn’t just work with Google Cloud Platform (GCP). It’s compatible with other major cloud providers as well, including AWS and Azure.

This is a big deal.

Most cloud vendors don’t want you migrating off of their platform. And if you decide to do so, it’s a fairly complicated and expensive process. Google doesn’t care about that. “We hear from our customers that multi-cloud and hybrid is really an acute pain point,” said Urs Hölzle, Google’s senior vice president of technical infrastructure.

Anthos lowers the barrier to entry and exit to the point where there’s no longer a barrier. If you can make a commitment to Kubernetes, you can have true cloud portability, including on-prem.

HSBC dives deep on the benefits of GKE On-Prem

Google announced GKE On-Prem in 2018. This new product would let organizations run a form of Google’s cloud in their own data center. In February 2019, Google officially launched the beta version.

GKE On-Prem, one of the building blocks of Anthos, provides a common toolkit for cloud and on-premises DevOps. It allows customers to federate the Kubernetes environment between on-prem and GKE, tethering all operations to the GCP control surfaces.

At Google Cloud Next 2019, HSBC took things a step further – with a deep dive into how it adopted the tool. “At HSBC, we needed a consistent platform to deploy both on-premises and in the cloud,” said Darryl West, Group CIO, HSBC. “Google Cloud’s software-based approach for managing hybrid environments provided us an innovative, differentiated solution that was able to be deployed quickly for our customers.”

A better way to handle loaner devices

Every company seems to have a problem with loaner devices from a client mobility standpoint. Maybe your laptop goes down or something else goes wrong, then you need to go down to the help desk and grab a new device, get it imaged, and wait for them to fix the problem with the original device.

Unfortunately, no one has developed a secure and easy-to-manage approach to dealing with loaner devices. Until now.

Google, in its own headquarters, has 16 Chromebooks available for anyone to use within the company. This idea is being expanded out in the form of a new program aptly named Grab and Go.

In addition to loaner devices, Grab and Go can support organizations that have fully adopted virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), and their end users don’t necessarily need to own their own laptops. Employees can simply grab a device off the cart, use it, and then reset it for the next person.

It’s a cost-saving and flexible model that should prove to be beneficial in the enterprise space. We’ll have a working prototype in our Executive Briefing Center at the SHI Summit in June.

GCP moving forward

Google has been third place in the public cloud market but seems hungry to compete by lowering the barrier to entry for hybrid and multi-cloud.

All in all, the event succeeded in getting organizations excited about the potential of Anthos, GKE On-Prem, and Grab and Go, setting up Google to make deeper inroads into the enterprises in the coming months.

Kevin English contributed to this post.