The rise of “Serverless Cloud Computing”

In 2022, we will definitely continue to see cloud computing adoption and growth accelerate. As companies move beyond their initial forays into cloud computing and have established its benefits, they are also looking for additional uses. There is growing momentum in the market for Serverless platforms, including AWS Lambda, Azure Functions, IBM Cloud Functions, and Google Cloud Functions.

In simple words.. "Serverless" is a cloud execution model that enables cloud-native applications to be built and operated more efficiently and cost-effectively.

Sometimes referred to as "functions-as-a-service," ?it promises a truly pay-as-you-go service where the infrastructure scales transparently as the application needs it. With serverless computing, the service provider takes care of all the infrastructure (server-side IT), which means all your team needs to do is write code. Technically, servers are still involved. The difference between serverless computing and traditional enterprise architectures is not the lack of servers, but rather how they are implemented and managed.

Top benefits of serverless computing:

• No infrastructure management: With a serverless platform, you simply deploy your code, and it runs with high availability.
• Dynamic scalability: With serverless computing, the infrastructure dynamically scales up and down within seconds to match the demands of any workload.
• Faster time to market: Serverless applications reduce the operations dependencies on each development cycle, increasing teams’ agility to deliver more functionality in less time.
• More efficient use of resources: Shifting to serverless technologies helps organizations reduce TCO.

Serverless Computing Offering from AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google, and IBM

AWS serverless: AWS Lambda and AWS Lambda@Edge

• As AWS Lambda is capable of running codes in parallel and processing each one individually, your applications have high scalability.
• By hosting applications on multiple servers, application resiliency is improved. AWS automatically switches servers if one goes down, so your code does not miss a beat.
• You can run Lambda functions in AWS Lambda@Edge to modify AWS CloudFront-delivered content. As a result, functions are executed closer to the user. It’s a step forward by AWS to take serverless to the edge.

Microsoft Serverless: Azure Functions and Azure Event Grid

• You can build the apps you need with complete scalability and in the programming language of your choice, without worrying about infrastructure or servers.
• Integrate continuous deployment and monitoring tools to manage issues.
• You can create web applications with event-based architectures using Azure Event Grid serverless. Users must first choose the Azure resources, then the WebHook endpoint or event handler to which they want to transmit the event.

Google Serverless: Cloud Functions and App Engine

• Google Cloud Functions is a serverless execution environment for building and connecting cloud services. The code is run in a completely managed environment, thus no infrastructure or server management is required.
• Google App Engine is a serverless application platform that is totally managed by Google. You can use it to create and deploy your applications on a fully managed platform. Without having to manage or worry about the underlying infrastructure, applications may be scaled as needed.

IBM serverless: IBM Cloud Functions based on Apache OpenWhisk

• The?IBM?Cloud?Functions?are?built?on?Apache?OpenWhisk,?a?platform?that?allows?developers?to?build?and?exchange?code?across?several?environments.?Developers?may?run?their?code?on?demand?in?a?highly?scalable?environment?without?having?to?worry?about?vendor?lock-in?or?server?maintenance.

Serverless?computing?thus?represents?the?evolution?of?cloud?computing?from?infrastructure-as-a-service?(IaaS)?to?platform-as-a-service?(PaaS)?to?function-as-a-service?(FaaS).