A company that must keep only a subset of workloads in a highly secure private environment but cannot afford a fully private cloud is correct.

This option maps directly to the hybrid cloud model because hybrid cloud allows an organization to run sensitive or regulated workloads in a private environment while placing less sensitive workloads on public cloud infrastructure to save cost and gain elasticity. The hybrid approach provides the control and isolation needed for the small set of critical workloads and it also enables the company to avoid the capital and operational expense of a fully private cloud by using public cloud services for the remainder.

Hybrid clouds also support secure connectivity and data flows between private and public environments which helps with compliance and workload placement decisions. For an organization that only needs high security for a subset of services and that has budget constraints, hybrid cloud gives the best balance of security, flexibility, and cost.

A consortium of firms aiming to operate a shared customer platform for all their users is not the best fit for hybrid cloud. A consortium that wants a single shared platform is more likely to gain from a community or multi-tenant public cloud model that maximizes shared governance and economies of scale rather than the split private/public model that hybrid offers.

A small neighborhood shop with minimal sensitive data that only wants to migrate its email to the cloud does not need hybrid cloud. This scenario is better served by simple public SaaS or hosted email services which are easier and cheaper to manage than a hybrid deployment.

A regional hospital network that insists all patient records remain in the most secure environment regardless of cost would not gain the greatest advantage from hybrid cloud. If every record must stay in the most secure environment and cost is not a concern then a fully private or on premises solution is the appropriate choice rather than splitting workloads between private and public clouds.

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