In addition to the foundation of the cloud platform, a company must decide how to leverage its existing assets. While the value proposition of cloud computing is not debated much anymore, the pace of migration and how fast to deprecate existing assets is. Using a hybrid cloud approach for the beginning of the cloud native journey is very common, and lets the company easily operate with its two existing groups (the legacy group and the cloud-first group). This approach will also enable a cheaper pathway to success, since it doesn't require a 'big bang' migration from existing data centers to the cloud, but allows for individual projects, business units, or other segregated areas to move faster than others.

All cloud vendors have a hybrid architecture option that can be leveraged when a company wants to keep some workloads in their data centers and have others in the cloud. This hybrid architecture approach typically involves setting up some type of network connectivity from one or more data center(s) to one or more cloud vendor geographical region(s). This network connectivity can take place in the form of a VPN over public internet paths, or various dedicated fiber options. Regardless of the type of connectivity, the outcome should be a single network that makes all company resources and workloads visible to each other (within security and governance constraints). Typical patterns for a hybrid cloud architecture are:

• Legacy workloads on-premises and new projects in the cloud
• Production workloads on-premises and non-production in the cloud
• Disaster recovery environment in the cloud
• Storage or archival in the cloud
• On-premises workloads bursting into the cloud for additional capacity

Over time, as more workloads are migrated into the cloud or retired from the on-premises environments, the center of gravity will shift to the cloud and an organization will have more resources in the cloud than on-premises. This progress is natural, and will signify the tipping point of a company that is well into its cloud native journey. Eventually, a cloud native company would expect to have all of its workloads in the cloud and remove just about all hybrid connectivity options since they are no longer in use. At that point, the organization would be considered a mature cloud native company.