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Opening Innovation with OpenShift Container Platform

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Drive your digital transformation with OpenShift

Red Hat® OpenShift® is an enterprise container platform for managing hybrid cloud foundation for building and scaling containerized applications. The choice of many companies for a secure platform that works in concert with Kubernetes, OpenShift automates the container life cycle, embeds security into the container pipeline, helps DevOps teams optimize developer productivity, and fosters innovation. 

OpenShift’s full-stack automated operations and self-service provisioning for developers are features that help teams efficiently move ideas from development to production in a cloud environment.  A study of business leaders around the globe conducted by IDC reported:

  • 20% higher DevOps and development team productivity
  • 21% more efficient IT infrastructure teams
  • 29% faster application development lifecycles

 

Platform implementation can also mean big business benefits. Respondents to the IDC study reported:

  • 636% five-year return on investment
  • 10 months to payback
  • $21.62 million in higher annual revenue

Considerations for Replatforming to OpenShift


Like many strategic initiatives, replatforming to OpenShift encompasses people and processes as well as the technology. These are among the questions you should consider when planning such an initiative:

  • What will change from your current state?
  • What cultural shifts are needed for the change (e.g. processes, role descriptions)?
  • Is your organization ready for this change?
  • If not, what needs to take place to be ready?
  • What investments and protocols (e.g. communication) are needed to effectively manage the change?
  • Will this be a lift and shift only or will you use the replatforming to rethink other aspects of the organization?
  • How will you anticipate and balance competing priorities?
  • What is your rollout strategy?
  • How will you manage security?
  • How and what will you monitor and measure in real time?

Platform as a Product


The transition to OpenShift calls for a parallel transition in viewpoint in terms of platform management. Treating OpenShift as a product (as opposed to a system or software application) can maximize its value because it puts the “customer” (i.e. developer) at the center of strategy. Managing the platform as a product can enable new activities and allow current activities to be automated, streamlined, or simplified.

More significantly, taking a product management approach to OpenShift can allow a development team to take an idea that arises in the morning and run it in production in the afternoon. This momentum can open innovation floodgates and create immense value to business operations and the bottom line.

Managing Complexity with the Right Partner


The benefits of OpenShift and the advantages of viewing the platform as a product are accompanied by complexity that must be addressed and managed. In certain situations, the viewpoint and expertise of a third party partner can facilitate successful implementation. For example:

  • The business is a complete greenfield when it comes to containerization and now wants to adopt it.
  • The business has a few teams using containers and it now wants to expand use across more teams.
  • While the business understands that containerization is the right direction, there is no knowledge within the organization around which applications fit well with containers and which don’t.
  • Some operations teams can adopt an OpenShift platform relatively easily, while others don’t have the bandwidth to accommodate that change.

Including a strategic partner with OpenShift and Kubernetes knowledge along with a portfolio of projects to back up their expertise can make a significant difference in the outcome of a transition. The right partner can:

  • Offer recommendations for determining specifications for the OpenShift platform.
  • Help determine what dev teams need to improve productivity and how containerization can accomplish that.
  • Train team members to help them reskill.

A knowledgeable and trusted partner can also support the change management activities that invariably attend adoption of a new technology.

Besides being an efficient approach to managing Kubernetes-driven container environments, OpenShift can open the door to a wide range of technology strategies like artificial intelligence/machine learning, data analytics, and continuous integration/continuous deployment. Benefits result in reduced operational overhead and quick application delivery, bringing more value to the business. An effective replatforming approach, managing the platform as a product, and teaming up with the right technology partner will set the organization up for success, today and beyond.

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