Hybrid computing is no longer an “if” for firms but a “when,” according to a recent webcast hosted by 451 Research.

“Overall, hybrid just happens,” said Melanie Posey, research vice president and general manager at 451 Research. “No one said ‘Let’s craft our hybrid strategy.”

The hybrid computing environment has become the new norm for the industry in recent years due to the constant evolution of IT delivery and consumption, she added. “As a result, you end top with some legacy, some cloud, some on-premises, some off-premises, some public cloud, and some private cloud.”

Also driving the hybrid environment further is the staggering growth in big data and data center traffic. By 2021, 451 Research estimated that the amount of stored data would increase to 402 exabytes (approximately 402 million terabytes) while data center traffic may reach as much as 20.6 zettabytes (approximately 21,000 exabytes.)

Firms will need to learn how to live with a foot in multiple computing environments whether it is for rapid development, disaster recovery, or on-demand computing resources.

Just as firms can no longer purely rely on IT infrastructures that they host themselves; Posey doubted that organization could migrate to the cloud entirely.

“There are workloads that involve internal core business systems, which may be running on legacy IT infrastructure and possibly powered by legacy applications,” she said. “A lot of these core business systems are the crown jewels of a lot of companies, and there is an understandable reluctance to put them out in a cloud environment.”

According to a recent survey conducted by 451 Research, approximately 60% of the respondents claim to be moving to a unified IT environment in which it would be a unified and integrated environment.

“Despite what you hear about people going ‘all in’ with the public cloud, we had 18% that said they were moving to a completely off-premises cloud environment,” said Posey. “For a majority, the cloud is part of the mix but not an entirety of the IT infrastructure.”

For the 8% of the respondents who said that cloud is not essential, she noted that it would become part of their strategy as upstarts who can spin up and down their IT infrastructure in the cloud begin disrupting their businesses.