Cloud is the foundation for a digital transformation in a world where the number of bits & bytes is growing exponentially every day. And that is confirmed by the numbers: according to a recent IDC report, cloud infrastructure spending increased by 31.1% in 2018, to $62.2 billion1. But even if it’s clear that going from on-premise infrastructure to cloud continues to trend, you still have to persuade your management that cloud storage — private, public or hybrid — is the way forward.
This is certainly true if the in-house facts don’t speak for themselves, such as when your on-premise system continues to do its job in terms of basic functionality. Therefore, this blog sums up some benefits that your most important stakeholders should be sensitive to: a lower TCO, more power of innovation and better performance.
Lower Total Cost of Ownership
Organizations with on-premise infrastructure will typically overbuy capacity to make sure they never end up in a situation where they can’t keep up with the demanded load. According to figures of AWS, on-premise IT is only 45% utilized on average2. In contrast to on-premise solutions, cloud infrastructure enables organizations to easily add or remove resources to meet real-time demands.
Furthermore, cloud storage enables a shift from a CapEx (Capital Expenditure) model to an OpEx (Operating Expenditure) one, eliminating large upfront investments. This may allow companies to avoid large increases in IT spending. Furthermore, it frees up budget for other investments that are more closely linked to the core of your business.
Focus on innovation
The cloud is a driver for innovation in several ways. Among other things, it is capable of unlocking access to massive computing power when needed. In the past, only multinationals could dream of access to these amounts of resources, whereas today even the smallest start-ups can run in-depth analyses on a large scale. Thus, the threshold to innovation is lowered.
The cloud can also free up time from in-house IT teams. Think of the myriad system infrastructure management and maintenance requirements that are done by your cloud provider. And as the release cycles of cloud functionality are much shorter than those of on-premise solutions, organizations can benefit much faster from technological advancements.
Cloud also speeds up time to market: organizations can enroll new technologies and create cloud-based development resources rapidly.
Better performance
Cloud providers guarantee very high uptime of their services. With the maturing of the internet, downtime is less common, and big cloud storage providers are also getting less vulnerable to cyberattacks. Although security has long been the ultimate counter-argument for cloud storage, reality has proven the opposite to be true. To put it bluntly, parties such as Amazon and Microsoft can’t afford to have problems with data security. Moreover, they have greater assets to invest in security and availability. Compare this with the choice of driving or flying to your destination. Statistically, it’s safer to fly than to drive, but there are a lot of people who are afraid of flying simply because they have to relinquish control.
And what if something does go wrong after all? When your data is stored in the cloud, data back-up can quickly and easily be provisioned.
A dose of common sense
The above mentioned benefits clearly show the differentiating power that cloud storage can bring. Nevertheless, building the business case for cloud storage also requires some common sense. For a company with big peaks in storage usage it will be easier to prove the business case for hosting in the cloud than for a company with a steady storage demand. However, in both cases, the business case has to start with the business objectives: why does your organization want to move to the cloud and what do you want to get out of it. Once the objectives are clearly set, you can start calculating the costs of keeping your systems in-house versus the costs of migrating to the cloud.
Do you want more advice on how to make business case and/or to calculate your potential savings? Contact one of our experts now.
1 https://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prUS44358318
2 https://www.zdnet.com/article/cloud-computing-how-to-build-a-business-case/
