Hybrid Cloud
In short
A hybrid cloud combines different operating models into one environment – in SMEs usually your own servers and public cloud services. A typical setup: email, files and collaboration run in the cloud, while industry software or a machine controller stays on site. What matters is that sign-in, permissions and backup work consistently across both parts.
What the strict definition says
The US standards body NIST defines a hybrid cloud as a composition of two or more distinct cloud infrastructures – private, community or public – bound together by technology that lets data and applications move between them (NIST SP 800-145, 2011).
In everyday SME usage the term is broader: any mix of on-premises and cloud. For the decision the difference hardly matters; for quotes it does – ask what a provider actually means by it.
The most common misconception: hybrid as a compromise
Hybrid is not half a step into the cloud but a model of its own, with its own price: complexity. Accounts, permissions, updates and backups have to line up across two worlds.
Without a central sign-in, the same file soon lives in three places – on the server, in OneDrive and on a USB stick. A hybrid setup only pays off when every part has a reason you can name for being where it is.
The Swiss angle
Many Swiss SMEs choose hybrid because some data is especially sensitive: patient records, professional secrets, plans under confidentiality. The Data Protection Act prescribes no particular location for this, but it does require that outsourcing to a service provider is governed (Art. 9 FADP) and that any disclosure abroad is safeguarded (Art. 16 FADP).
How we handle it
We first settle which system belongs where and why, then set up one sign-in and one backup for both sides. The working environment behind it is the modern workplace; the trade-offs in detail are in the article On-premises or cloud.
A term in your quote that nobody explained?
In a strategy call we translate the offer in front of you – even when it did not come from us.