Pomerania burned down

Of course I know the song, my wife says a little surprised, because it is a matter of course for her. My grandma taught it to me: "Maybug, fly. The father is in the war. Mother is in Pomerania, Pomerania burned down. Maybug, fly."

Now the cloud has burned down, at least a part of it, and as was reported in the media, at times over three million websites went offline as a result. Naturally, this major fire in the data center also fueled the cloud discussion at our SAP regulars' table.

Some of my colleagues were extremely nervous. Each of us at the SAP regulars' table is the ruler of several data centers. As Head of CIO, I can even say that I run at least one data center on each continent. None of us is completely protected against such a disaster.

For us, it is hard to imagine that a full fire and total failure can occur in a modern, state-of-the-art and properly managed data center. More detailed investigations will certainly be carried out by the local authorities and, in their own interest, also by OVHcloud.

The discussion about security, data protection and security, cloud versus on-premises, hyperscalers or personal responsibility has received new impetus. No one at our regulars' table is of the opinion that they have better fire protection and better security concepts than the hyperscalers, including OVHcloud. Nevertheless, the discussion is important and also result-oriented. Half-time result: Small is beautiful.

It was an interesting conversation many years ago in St. Leon-Rot, there in the industrial park where one of the large SAP data centers is located. In addition to the diesel gensets for the downstream emergency power supply, we discussed the challenge of data backup. The conversation started with the observation that with 7x24 dynamics and Big Data, there are no classic backup windows.

As an apprentice several decades ago, I learned that there was an RZ operation from 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m.. In between, backups had to be made - a big challenge even then, because the IBM tape drives take their time. But the programmers with their punch cards were no faster.

Accordingly, the discussion in St. Leon-Rot revolved around an optimal data backup concept for uninterrupted operation with extremely large data volumes. Due to the facts: Some data is just not backed up anymore. Something similar seems to have happened at OVHcloud.

Initial reports speak of irretrievable data loss. However, this could now turn the discourse on secure data storage in the cloud on a completely new tack. Many at our regulars' table agreed that a disaster in one's own area, with one's own insurance, team and infrastructure, is better to manage than blind dependence on a hyperscaler whose infrastructure is more in the fog than in the cloud. The promise that the data will remain DSGVO-compliant in Europe cannot always be verified.

In an FAZ article, Lotta Wieden writes about the cockchafer song: "Music versus lyrics is a dissonance of almost schizophrenic proportions. The enthusiasm with which SAP CEO Christian Klein wants to lift us into his or the hyperscalers' cloud seems almost fanatical to me.

There are many and good reasons for the cloud, but just as many and convincing arguments for on-premises. As long as Christian Klein does not explain and guarantee me a comprehensive cloud exit strategy including maintenance-free SAP licenses and full data access, I will remain very skeptical about SAP's cloud promises.

Pomerania can burn down anywhere, even at our company or at SAP. In any case, my own company fire department is equipped with the right extinguishing agents for this disaster, so that the server hardware has a minimal chance of survival - like the minimal hope that the father will come back from the war and the mother from Pomerania.