Why Saudi Retail Companies Should Consider Huawei's Local Cloud?
Getting Same Infrastructure or meeting specific needs
In retail companies, you always seek to combine high performance while maintaining reliable security for payment process and stored data. When evaluating any cloud hosting solution, your first priority is to assess how well it provides you both.
So, let’s assess Huawei Cloud as a new entrant in the Saudi IT market and see if Huawei infrastructure aligns with Your Retail IT Infrastructure.
1- Local Cloud Solution: Meeting Saudi Data Regulations
Due to Saudi data regulations that restrict hosting sensitive data on public clouds, local cloud solutions are essential. Accordingly, Huawei has established a cloud service hub in Riyadh, ensuring compliance with data residency regulations. This local data center joins a growing trend of major cloud providers like Oracle, V2, and soon, Microsoft, setting up shop in the Kingdom.
2- Huawei IT Infrastructure: Tailored for Retail Needs
IT infrastructure has the same components for all industries, but each industry has specific needs. Retail is one of the industries that depend most on both performance and security.
Let’s divide IT infrastructure into computing, networking, storage, and security and see whether Huawei cloud products serve each one of them in retail companies or not.
1) Retail Computing:
In retail, processing vast amounts of data and handling fluctuating workloads are constant challenges, especially during peak seasons like holiday sales.
So what components Huawei sets up to handle this:
1- Elastic Cloud Servers (ECS):
Elastic Cloud Servers (ECS) automatically distributes incoming traffic across multiple servers to enhance the service capabilities and fault tolerance of applications. This ensures that online stores, inventory management systems, and customer service platforms operate smoothly, even during unexpected surges in demand.
Its key features include:
- Scalable Resources: Adjust resources based on demand.
- Security: Ensures secure virtual environments.
- Diverse Configurations: Supports multiple instance types.
2- Cloud Container Instance (CCI):
Huawei Cloud Container Instance (CCI) is a serverless container engine allowing users to deploy containerized applications without managing clusters or servers.
Accordingly, each shop can be managed and updated independently, boosting flexibility and efficiency without disrupting the entire store. This leads to faster updates, enhanced performance, and reduced costs.
Its key features include:
- Heterogeneous Computing: Supports multiple architectures.
- Zero-Loss Networking: Ensures uninterrupted service.
- High Availability: Provides automatic failover solutions.
- Advanced Scheduling: Offers intelligent resource allocation.
- Security: Enhances protection with network policies and secure
2) Point of sale:
1- Auto scaling:
Huawei’s Auto Scaling dynamically adjust computing and bandwidth resources based on real-time demand, ensuring that the PoS systems continue to operate smoothly without delays or downtime.
Its key features include:
- Dynamic Resource Adjustment: Scales resources to meet real-time demands.
- Instance Health Management: Ensures system reliability.
- Cost Efficiency: Reduces expenses by scaling resources as needed.
2) Retail Storage:
1- Scalable File Service (SFS):
Huawei’s Scalable File Service (SFS) provides high-performance NAS file storage with shared access across multiple cloud servers. It is designed to handle large volumes of data with high durability and availability, ensuring that critical information is always accessible when needed.
Its key features include:
- High Durability (99.99999999%): Ensures minimal data loss, safeguarding valuable retail information.
- High Performance: Supports fast data access for applications and operations.
- Flexible Configurations: Scales storage capacity and performance to meet fluctuating demands during peak seasons or promotions.
2- Storage Disaster Recovery Service (SDRS):
Huawei’s Storage Disaster Recovery Service (SDRS) offers cross-AZ and cross-region disaster recovery for ECSs with minimal downtime. It ensures fast service recovery with an RPO of seconds and RTO of minutes, providing reliable, efficient, and cost-effective disaster recovery solutions.
Its key features include:
- Fast Recovery: RPO of seconds and RTO of minutes.
- Easy Management: One-click DR and DR drills.
- Cost-Effective: No need for DR equipment rooms; pay-per-use.
- Secure: Data consistency checks, two-way authentication, and encrypted transmission.
3) Retail Networking:
A reliable network is vital for connecting multiple retail locations securely and efficiently.
Huawei Virtual Private Network (VPN) establishes secure connections between various retail sites and Huawei Cloud, supporting essential features such as:
- High Data Security: Uses IPsec encryption.
- High Availability: Features active-active gateways.
- Flexible Access: Adapts to diverse network needs.
According to construction’s vast amounts of stored data and the continuous generation of new unstructured data, DLI is a service designed for processing large volumes of unstructured data. This includes sensor data from construction sites and equipment.
Its key features include:
- Serverless Processing: Eliminates the need for infrastructure management, allowing IT teams to focus on data analysis rather than hardware.
- SQL Compatibility: Supports standard SQL, making it easy for IT teams to use without requiring specialized training.
- High Performance: Provides fast query responses for large datasets, enabling quick insights and timely decisions.
- Cross-Source Analysis: Analyzes data from various sources without the need for data migration, allowing for comprehensive insights from disparate data points.
5) Retail Cybersecurity Measures:
Protecting sensitive customer and business data against cyber threats is a top priority for retail IT managers, requiring comprehensive and advanced security measures.
Firewalls, intrusion detection systems, and data encryption are essential to protect sensitive customer information and financial transactions from cyberattacks.
1- Host Security Service
Retailers often manage vast amounts of sensitive customer data, including payment information, making them prime targets for cyberattacks such as ransomware and data breaches. Huawei’s Host Security Service (HSS) mitigates these risks by managing vulnerabilities, maintaining compliance, and protecting against intrusions.
Its key features include:
- Wide Applicability: Protects virtual machines (VMs), physical machines, and containers across retail’s multiple IT environments, from e-commerce platforms to point-of-sale (POS) systems.
- Quick Alarm Reporting: Generates alarms for security issues within seconds, ensuring prompt responses to potential threats.
- High Performance: Detects over 99% of known ransomware with minimal CPU usage.
- Multiple Editions: Tailored for varying security needs, addressing the specific requirements of retail operations and customer data protection.
1- Cloud Firewall
Huawei’s Cloud Firewall (CFW) is a next-generation, cloud-native firewall designed to meet the specific security needs of the retail industry. It helps retailers who increasingly adopt cloud services for operations, such as inventory management and customer service platforms.
Its key features include:
- Elastic and Flexible: Easy to deploy with low costs, making it accessible for retailers transitioning to or expanding their cloud presence.
- Comprehensive Protection: Intrusion detection, antivirus, and traffic protection to shield retail operations from common cyber threats like data breaches and DDoS attacks.
- High Reliability: Cluster deployment for uninterrupted services, critical for maintaining continuous operations during peak shopping periods.
- Integration: It works with multiple Huawei Cloud services for enhanced security management.
3- Web Application Firewall
As more customers engage with retailers online, the risk of attacks like SQL injections, cross-site scripting, and other OWASP top 10 threats grows.
Huawei’s Web Application Firewall (WAF) protects retail web applications and websites from the increasing threats in the digital retail environment.
Its key features include:
- High Availability: 99.95% SLA with multi-region disaster recovery, ensuring that retail websites remain operational even during cyberattacks.
- Threat Detection: AI dual engines detect and neutralize threats, protecting customer data and maintaining trust in the retail brand.
- Custom Protection: Customizable policies and quick virtual patching for zero-day vulnerabilities, addressing specific threats to retail operations and ensuring compliance with industry standards.
- Compliance Assistance: Supports PCI DSS certification, helping retailers meet regulatory requirements and protect payment data from cyber threats.
Final Thoughts
As retail companies try to meet both market demands and regulatory requirements, understanding the capabilities and offerings of cloud providers like Huawei is be crucial. IT managers need to think about the good things new technology can do for their company, but they also need to make sure it helps the company reach its goals. This way, they can make smart choices that will help the company grow in a world that’s becoming more and more digital.