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documentation.suse.com / Layered Stack Deployment of K3s / Business aspect
Applies to SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP3, K3s 1.20.14

2 Business aspect

Agility is driving developers toward more cloud-native methodologies that focus on microservices architectures and streamlined workflows. Container technologies, like Kubernetes, embody this agile approach and help enable cloud-native transformation.

By unifying IT operations with Kubernetes, organizations realize key benefits like increased reliability, improved security and greater efficiencies with standardized automation. Therefore, Kubernetes infrastructure platforms are adopted by enterprises to deliver:

Cluster Operations

Improved Production and DevOps efficiencies with simplified cluster usage and robust operations

Security Policy & User Management

Consistent security policy enforcement plus advanced user management on any Kubernetes infrastructure

Access to Shared Tools & Services

A high level of reliability with easy, consistent access to a broad set of tools and services

2.1 Business problem

Kubernetes is the leading solution to address edge computing use cases in industry verticals such as manufacturing, transportation, power generation, healthcare, retail and banking. Typical edge systems that leverage Kubernetes to run complex workloads include energy meters, aircraft engines, gas & oil rigs, cruise ships, high-speed trains, retail scanners, wind turbine base stations, internet-connected cars, ATMs and much more.

For such target edge systems, which are often unattended, resource constrained and remote, orchestrating containerized workloads on Kubernetes deployments may seem overbearingly complex.

2.2 Business value

After two years of research and development in June 2020, K3s was donated to the CNCF. The donation is a testament of the commitment to the open source community and their mission to run Kubernetes everywhere.

Perfect for Edge

K3s is a highly available, certified Kubernetes distribution specifically designed for production workloads in unattended, resource-constrained, remote locations or inside IoT appliances.

Simplified & Secure

K3s is packaged as a tiny, single binary that reduces the dependencies and steps needed to install, run and auto-update a production Kubernetes cluster. For workloads, automated Manifest and Helm Chart managment deployments can be used. Also, multiple architectures, like x86_64, ARM64, and ARMv7, are supported with binaries and images available.

Given its extensive Kubernetes capabilities, K3s can also be a suitable choice for:

  • embedded platforms,

  • continuous integration and continuous deployment platforms,

  • branch locations or individual developer deployments, and

  • even core or cloud production instances

Tip
Tip

When K3s is imported and combined with SUSE Rancher, organizations are equipped with an easy, complete and reliable management solution for Kubernetes at the edge.

With this increased consistency of the deployed and managed Kubernetes infrastructure clusters, organizations benefit from an even higher level of the Cloud Native Computing model where each layer only relies upon the API and version of the adjacent layer, such as:

Compute Platform

Using the above software application and technology solutions with the server platforms offered by Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) provides many alternative for scale, cost-effectiveness and performance options that could align with local IT staff platform preferences:

  • density-optimized - high performance and efficiency for big data and the most demanding workloads

  • mission-critical - systems of intelligence to fuel your digital transformation in a world where time and data are the new currency and business continuity is expected

  • composable - fully adaptable and ready for Hybrid-IT to future-proof your data center for today’s workloads and tomorrow’s disruptors

  • IoT - realize the potential of the Internet of Things to provide compute at the network edge

  • cloud - high-capacity, mass-compute open infrastructure with security and software to match

  • and virtualized use cases.