intercloud

Intercloud is a term used in cloud computing to describe the vision of a globally interconnected collection of cloud environments—public, private, and community clouds—that can interoperate and share workloads and data seamlessly. The concept envisions standardized interfaces, governance, and security policies to enable portability and interoperability across cloud providers.

Origins and scope: The term gained prominence in the early 2010s as vendors and researchers discussed mechanisms to connect separate cloud ecosystems into a larger cloud fabric. While the idea of an international, interoperable cloud environment remains aspirational, many projects and partnerships aim to improve cross-cloud portability and management. There is no single universally adopted standard for intercloud interoperability; instead, efforts are pursued through a mix of open standards and industry initiatives.

Key components: Intercloud interoperability relies on common APIs and data formats, cross-cloud identity and access management, data portability and policy-driven governance, and layered security controls. A control plane for orchestration, monitoring, and provisioning across providers, along with reliable connectivity, high availability, and performance management, is also central.

Architecture: An intercloud typically features an intercloud fabric spanning multiple providers, with edge and on-premises components and a centralized or federated management layer. This enables policy-based workload placement, failover arrangements, and consistent management across clouds.

Benefits and challenges: Potential benefits include improved resource utilization, resilience, and agility, as well as easier disaster recovery and workload mobility. Challenges include varying regulatory requirements, data sovereignty, security models, trust boundaries, performance variability, and the lack of a universally adopted standard, which often makes adoption gradual and hybrid-cloud focused.