We have blocked the public access of applications hosted on cloud- Navneet Agarwal, Director IT, Agarwal Movers and Packers

Despite security concerns, cloud adoption is increasingly gaining steam with organizations across verticals making the shift to tap into scalability, cost savings, and productivity benefits offered by the platform. To understand how cloud is being used in the transportation industry, Dataquest spoke to Navneet Agarwal, Director IT, Agarwal Movers and Packers.

Some edited excerpts:

How does cloud computing fit in your workplace and what kind of applications have you put on the cloud?
We are coming up with many applications along with mobile apps and for them cloud is the best solution. With cloud, the manpower and their time can be properly utilized in improving/enhancing the apps instead of managing the server. Biggest advantage of the cloud is that it is scalable and at the same time reduces investment in maintaining own infrastructure.

What steps have you taken to ensure security with the cloud model?
For security reasons, we have blocked the public access of applications hosted on the cloud and the access is given to internal users only. The VPN is also integrated to access our internal applications. We are a little liberal on security policy but we use vault feature for safety.

Do you think moving on cloud is secure than the traditional infrastructure model?
Pros and cons are always there in every system but it is always recommended to go with big/reputed brands that work on secure platforms rather than just making the things available for their customers in the market. The more it is designed in a secured way, the more reliable it will be.

What advice would you like to share with your fellow CIOs with regards to cloud?
Always keep in mind that cloud should be kept straight and simple and should fulfill all the requirements.

Going forward, what are your key priorities as an IT leader for your organization?
My key priority will be to have actionable and authentic data for business insights. We aim to tap into data to get a 360 degree view of the business and gain a competitive advantage. This data will be managed and analyzed by our internal IT team. We are also trying to launch a logistics platform.

Can you give us example on how your firm is leveraging technology to gain business advantage
We are using technology to create a differentiator in the competitive industry. Our trucking cubes are fitted with GPS for on-time tracking. This has helped us reduce the cost by 18% to 20% and service levels have gone up by 200%.