Top 10 Multi-Cloud 
Management Tools 
for 2024 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

What is a Multi-Cloud Management Platform? Benefits of a Multi-Cloud Management Platform

Emerging Trends in Multi-cloud Management

10 Multi-cloud Management Tools to Watch Out CloudZero LaceWork Terraform Ansible Cloudify Morpheus Dynatrace CloudBolt VMware vRealize Suite Cloud4C's Universal Cloud Platform (UCP)

Multi-cloud Management with Cloud4C

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Did you know - 89% of enterprises now use a multi-cloud strategy?

This staggering statistic underlines the massive shift towards distributed cloud infrastructures. As organizations increasingly spread their workloads across multiple cloud providers, the need for robust multi cloud management tools have never been greater.

Most organizations use more than one public cloud service provider because it helps them reduce dependency on just one vendor. It also makes it possible for them to optimize cloud usage and costs according to specific requirements. The numerous benefits - enhanced flexibility, reduced vendor lock-in, and the ability to leverage best-of-breed services from different providers - are why organizations tend to lean towards a multi-cloud environment. However, it also introduces significant operational and management complexity.

Managing resources, ensuring security and compliance, and optimizing costs across multiple cloud environments can quickly become overwhelming without the right tools and strategies in place thereby requiring a single pane of glass management interface for all landscapes. In this blog, we'll explore the top 10 multi cloud management tools that are helping organizations tame the complexity of multi-cloud environments in 2024. Let's get started.

Before diving into specific tools, it is crucial to understand what a multi-cloud management platform really is, and why it's become so critical in modern IT environments.

What is a Multi-Cloud Management Platform?

Multicloud management is the process of overseeing and controlling multiple cloud computing services and providers within a single heterogeneous architecture.

A Multi-Cloud Management Platform (CMP) is a comprehensive software solution designed to manage, monitor, and optimize resources and applications across multiple cloud environments, including public, private, and hybrid clouds.

Benefits of a Multi-Cloud Management Platform:

• Provides a single pane of glass for monitoring and managing resources across diverse cloud environments.
• Enables tracking, allocation, and optimization of cloud spending across multiple providers.
• Implements consistent security policies and compliance controls across all cloud platforms.
• Streamlines resource provisioning and workflow management across different cloud services.
• Offers real-time insights into application and infrastructure performance across all clouds.
• Ensures consistent governance and compliance across multi-cloud environments.
• Facilitates easier migration of workloads between different cloud platforms.
• Simplifies adherence to regulatory requirements across multiple cloud environments.
• Reduces vendor lock-in by enabling management of diverse cloud services through a single interface.
• Supports faster application deployment and management across multiple clouds.

Emerging Trends in Multi-Cloud Management

1. AI and Machine Learning Integration: Artificial Intelligence (AI) and ML are increasingly being incorporated into multi cloud management platforms to provide predictive analytics, automate complex tasks, and offer intelligent insights for optimization.
2. Edge Computing Integration: With the rise of edge computing, multi cloud management tools are expanding to include edge resources, enabling seamless management from core to cloud to edge.
3. FinOps Practices: Financial DevOps (FinOps services) is becoming a crucial aspect of multi-cloud management, with tools incorporating more advanced cost optimization and financial governance features.
4. Zero Trust Security: As security remains a top concern, multi-cloud management platforms are adopting zero trust principles to enhance security across distributed environments.
5. Kubernetes-Centric Management: With Kubernetes services becoming the de facto standard for container orchestration, many multi-cloud management tools are focusing on Kubernetes-centric approaches to application and infrastructure management.

10 Multi-Cloud Management Tools to Watch Out

1. CloudZero

CloudZero AnyCost is a cloud cost intelligence tool designed to help organizations understand and optimize cloud spending across multiple providers. It focuses on providing real-time cost insights, unit economics analysis, and FinOps-oriented reporting.

CloudZero Key Features:

• Cost Anomaly Detection Engine: Uses machine learning (ML) to identify unusual spending patterns in real-time.
• Unit Economics Analyzer: Breaks down costs to the level of individual products, features, or customer segments.
• Multi-Cloud Cost Allocation System: Provides a unified view of costs across different cloud providers.
• CI/CD Integration Module: Integrates with development pipelines to provide cost awareness during the development process.
• FinOps Reporting Dashboard: Offers customizable reports and visualizations for financial and technical stakeholders.

Use Case: A SaaS company uses CloudZero to gain visibility into their product costs across AWS cloud and Azure. By understanding the unit economics of each feature, they can optimize their pricing strategy and improve profitability.

2. LaceWork

LaceWork is a cloud security posture management (CSPM) tool that helps organizations maintain security and compliance across multi-cloud environments. It offers continuous compliance monitoring, automated security assessments, and remediation recommendations.

LaceWork Key Features:

• Continuous Compliance Engine: Constantly monitors cloud resources against various regulatory standards (e.g., HIPAA, PCI DSS, GDPR).
• Automated Security Assessment Tool: Regularly scans cloud environments for vulnerabilities and misconfigurations.
• Multi-Cloud Asset Inventory: Provides a centralized inventory of all cloud resources across providers.
• Policy Enforcement Module: Allows creation and enforcement of custom security policies.
• Remediation Recommendation System: Offers actionable advice to address identified security issues.

LaceWork's strength lies in its ability to provide a unified security and compliance view across diverse cloud environments. Its automation capabilities can significantly reduce the manual effort required for security audits and compliance checks. The multi cloud management platform’s integration with CI/CD pipelines enables organizations to implement "shift-left" security practices, catching potential issues early in the development process.

3. Terraform

Terraform is an open-source infrastructure-as-code tool that enables version control, peer review, automated testing of infrastructure changes and management of resources across multiple cloud providers. Its provider ecosystem is extensive, covering not just major cloud providers but also numerous SaaS platforms and other services.

Terraform Key Features:

• Terraform Core: The main engine that reads configuration files and manages state.
• Terraform Configuration Language (HCL): A declarative language for defining infrastructure.
• Provider Plugins: Interfaces with various cloud providers and services.
• State Management System: Keeps track of the current state of infrastructure.
• Module System: Allows creation of reusable, composable infrastructure components.

Use Case: A global e-commerce company employs Terraform to standardize their infrastructure deployment across AWS and Microsoft Azure. By codifying their infrastructure, they can reduce the time to launch new regional online storefronts from weeks to days. This agility allows them to rapidly expand into new markets.

4. Ansible

Ansible is an open-source automation tool for configuration management, application deployment, and task automation across multi-cloud environments. It uses YAML-based playbooks and has an agentless architecture.

Ansible Key Features:

• Ansible Playbooks: YAML files that define automation tasks.
• Inventory System: Manages the hosts and groups that Ansible interacts with.
• Ansible Modules: Pre-built units of code for performing specific tasks.
• Ansible Tower (now part of Red Hat Automation Platform): Provides a web-based UI and REST API for managing Ansible.

Use Case: A BFSI firm used Ansible to automate patch management across their hybrid cloud environment, reducing the time required for security updates by 70% and improving overall compliance.

5. Cloudify

Cloudify's model-driven approach to orchestration allows complex environments to be described in a standardized way. Its ability to manage both cloud and network resources makes it particularly valuable in telecommunications and other network-intensive industries.

Cloudify Key Features:

• TOSCA-based Orchestration Engine: Uses the OASIS TOSCA standard for describing service templates.
• Multi-Cloud Resource Management: Manages resources across various cloud providers and on-premises environments.
• Service Composition Module: Allows complex services to be composed from simpler components.
• Policy Engine: Enables definition and enforcement of scaling and healing policies.
• Plugin Framework: Allows integration with various tools and services.

Use Case: An Internet Service Provider (ISP) can leverage Cloudify to orchestrate the deployment and scaling of virtual network functions (VNFs). This enables them to launch new services, such as virtual firewalls and software-defined WAN, much faster than before.

6. Morpheus

Morpheus is a multi-cloud management and orchestration tool that focuses on simplifying complex cloud operations through automation and self-service capabilities. It provides unified orchestration, policy enforcement, and cloud cost optimization features.

Morpheus Key Features:

• Unified Orchestration Engine: Manages resources across multiple cloud providers and on-premises environments.
• Policy and Governance Module: Enforces compliance and security policies across all managed environments.
• Cost Analytics and Optimization Tool: Provides insights into cloud spending and recommendations for optimization.
• Self-Service Portal: Allows users to provision and manage resources within defined guardrails.
• Monitoring and Logging System: Provides visibility into the performance and status of managed resources.

Use Case: A media streaming company uses Morpheus to manage their multi-cloud infrastructure. The self-service capabilities let their development teams quickly provision resources for new content delivery pipelines, reducing time-to-market for new streaming features.

7. Dynatrace

Dynatrace is an AI-powered observability and application performance monitoring tool. It offers automatic discovery and mapping of resources, enabling real-time performance monitoring. Its AI-driven approach to problem detection can significantly reduce mean time to resolution (MTTR) for incidents.

Dynatrace Key Features:

• OneAgent Technology: Automatically discovers and maps all components and dependencies in the application environment.
• Dynatrace AI Engine (Davis): Provides AI-driven problem detection and root cause analysis.
• Real-Time Topology Mapping: Visualizes the entire application stack in real-time.
• Digital Experience Monitoring: Tracks user experiences across web and mobile applications.
• Cloud Automation Module: Enables automated responses to detected issues.

Use Case: An online gaming company, for instance, deploys Dynatrace to monitor their complex, microservices-based gaming platform across multiple cloud providers. The tool's AI-driven problem detection here helps them identify and resolve performance issues before they impact users, reducing game lag complaints and improving player retention rates.

8. CloudBolt

CloudBolt is a cloud management and integration tool that emphasizes ease of use and rapid time-to-value for multi-cloud environments. The multi cloud management platform's extensive integration capabilities allow it to fit into a wide range of existing IT ecosystems. It integrates over 20 resource handlers, such as AWS, Azure, Google Cloud Platform, to simplify provisioning and orchestration.

CloudBolt Key Features:

• Self-Service IT Portal: Provides a user-friendly interface for provisioning cloud resources.
• Workflow Automation Engine: Enables creation and execution of complex, multi-step workflows.
• Cost Transparency Module: Provides visibility into cloud spending and chargeback capabilities.
• Integration Framework: Allows integration with a wide range of IT tools and cloud services.
• Resource Quota Management System: Enables fine-grained control over resource allocation.

Use Case: An insurance company implements CloudBolt to create a self-service IT portal for their actuarial and claims processing teams. This allows the teams to quickly provision pre-approved, compliant resources across multiple cloud providers, reducing the time to set up new risk analysis environments from weeks to hours.

9. VMware vRealize Suite

VMware vRealize Suite provides a comprehensive set of multi-cloud management tools that provide a unified approach to managing multi-cloud environments. It includes tools for automation, operations management, log analysis, and network insights. Its deep integration with VMware's virtualization technologies makes it particularly valuable for organizations with significant VMware investments.

VMware vRealize Suite Key Features:

• vRealize Automation: Enables rapid deployment of IT services across multi-cloud environments.
• vRealize Operations: Provides performance, capacity, and configuration management.
• vRealize Log Insight: Offers real-time log management and analytics.
• vRealize Network Insight: Delivers network visibility and security planning.
• vRealize AI Cloud: Provides AI-powered insights and recommendations.

10. Universal Cloud Platform (UCP)

Cloud4C's Universal Cloud Platform (UCP) is a comprehensive solution for organizations to centrally manage and optimize their multi-cloud environments. It is designed to address the complexities of modern IT landscapes, UCP provides a unified control plane to orchestrate resources, automate workflows, and ensure governance across public, private, and hybrid clouds.

UCP Key Features:

• Cost and Capacity Optimizer: Provides cost transparency, optimization, and resource capacity management across cloud environments.
• Cloud Lifecycle Manager: Facilitates cloud migration, disaster recovery, and continuous configuration automation, from interface to integration to cloud layer.
• Security and Governance Engine: Ensures robust security, identity management, policy enforcement, and regulatory compliance.
• Service Management Suite: Handles service level management, support, CRM, and service request management.
• Orchestration and Automation Hub: Enables provisioning, orchestration, and automation of cloud resources and workflows.
• Monitoring and Analytics Module: Offers comprehensive monitoring, metering, and performance analytics across all cloud platforms.
• Hyper Cloud Broker: Provides multi-cloud integration and management capabilities, allowing seamless operation across diverse cloud environments.
• Disaster Recovery Orchestrator: Manages cross-cloud disaster recovery with automated failover capabilities.

To effectively leverage these multi-cloud tools and keep up with the complex multi-cloud environments, organizations will require expertise from specialized cloud managed service providers, like Cloud4C.

Future of Multi-Cloud Management with Cloud4C

80% of enterprises will adopt a multi-cloud strategy by next year, signifying its growing importance and the need for effective management solutions!

While the tools discussed above offer powerful capabilities, implementing an effective multi-cloud strategy often requires expertise and ongoing support. This is where Cloud4C's expertise comes in handy!

We help enterprises harness the full potential of multi-cloud environments through our comprehensive managed services. From centralized data management and container orchestration to robust security and application modernization, we help you power through the complexities of hybrid and multi-cloud environments. As part of our proprietary SHOP™ platform, Cloud4C’s Universal Cloud Platform (UCP) centrally manages and optimizes the multi-cloud infrastructure from a single pane of glass, further providing unified control to orchestrate resources, automate workflows, and ensure governance.

Our services include:

• Unified Multi-Cloud Management - Centralized control of resources across public, private, and hybrid clouds
• Comprehensive Data Management - Multi-cloud data controller functioning as a global file system, connecting storage across multiple public clouds and on-premises environments
• Application Modernization and Orchestration - Kubernetes-as-a-service for efficient container management and microservices consulting and implementation
• Cost Optimization and FinOps - AI-driven cost analysis and optimization across all cloud platforms and implementation of FinOps best practices
• Intelligent Operations - AI/ML-powered proactive managed services, with 24/7 expert support and monitoring
• Migration and Architecture Planning - Hybrid cloud architecture design and implementation, seamless migration planning and execution and proactive managed services
• Advanced Security Tools - AWS, Azure and Google Cloud to provide unified visibility, health checks, alerting and risk eradication

Our certified professionals bring deep expertise in multi-cloud architectures, ensuring you benefit from best practices and industry-leading tools without the complexity of managing them in-house.

Contact us to know more!

Frequently Asked Questions: