After a certain period, technology had reached its momentum and continued to gain mainstream adoption in a short period. Not long ago, it was all about the cloud, then IT came, and now, everyone is talking about edge computing.

Edge computing is an evolved form of cloud computing. It is an operation or data processing that takes place at the edge of the network. Its contemporary design is used in IoT environments that provision IT resources including power and storage. As a result, it is an alternative to conventional or traditionally used cloud solutions with central servers.

Businesses making a shift from cloud to edge-based solutions also seek to address the limitations and pitfalls of the cloud. Issues such as the underlying costs, storage capacity, and bandwidth requirements present in cloud computing are disadvantageous. However, despite this clear definition, there are still companies that get confused in differentiating edge computing from other data processing solutions. Thus, scrutinizing what it can bring to the table can be an effective way to gain a full understanding of edge computing.

Potential Benefits of Edge Computing

Knowing whether or not edge computing is a great fit for your business, you need to first understand the benefits it gives.

• Faster Speed – Time is gold, and every business owner and leader are fully aware that every millisecond counts. A single downtime or a delay in the operation may cost businesses a fortune or even more. With edge computing, it has the capacity to speed up network speed and reduce delays. It can be done by reducing the distance and moving closer to the data source, right where the data is being generated. Through this, the rate, standard, and responsiveness of the overall service have been boosted.
 
• Improved Security – Compared with cloud computing, the information being stored on the cloud has the tendency to get easily hacked. However, as the main objective of edge computing is to address the shortcomings of the cloud, thus this can be prevented. Since edge computers may also allow devices to collect a large amount of data, it ensures that it is filtered. Only relevant and contextual information is being sent to the cloud.
 
• Enhanced Reliability – Since most of the time, edge computing does not depend on a steady internet connection and servers, it offers uninterruptible service. This is the reason why offered services cannot struggle with a slow internet connection or a network failure. Moreover, edge computing can also be used in remote areas or locations.
 
• Reduced Cost – Investing in IoT service can be really expensive due to their need for more network bandwidth, storage capacity, and computational ability. Edge computing can help you reduce the infrastructure required. Instead of expanding servers to make enough storage capacity, you can store your data directly with the user. With this, costs incurred in expanding for more resources and other additional infrastructure is also reduced.

Possible Pitfalls of Edge Computing

In the near term, the edge computing model faces some significant obstacles, several of which may not be that easy to overcome. Here are some of it:

• Incomplete Data – Edge computing only processes and analyzes partial sets of information, discarding the rest of the data. Because of this, most businesses using edge computing may end up losing valuable information without even knowing about it. Thus, before jumping to the decision of using edge computing, it is imperative to decide if you are willing with this setup or not.
 
• Expensive Initial Cost – Implementing an edge infrastructure may incur you a costly initial investment. This is due to the complexity of its design that requires additional equipment and resources. It also needs more local hardware for it to efficiently function.
 
• Maintenance Cost – Edge computing is a distributed system. Thus, it requires a higher maintenance cost compared with centralized cloud architecture.

Final Thoughts

It is hard to neglect the inevitability of edge computing. Since it is part of the evolution of cloud-based systems and such is bound to happen. As the technological world keeps on prospering, IoT will further expand which will eventually require edge computing to step in.