Since cloud services are so abundant, a lot of businesses want to jump on the bandwagon, too, hence the increase in users. Covid-19 pandemic has further accelerated the growth of cloud computing. According to that same report, companies can barely keep up with the pace of rising demand for cloud, and so they struggle with the budget. On average, they’re over the budget by an impressive 23% for cloud spend, and they expect the expenses to increase by another 47% during 2021.

These numbers are proof of the growing trend of migrating to cloud. With barely any downsides, cloud computing isn’t expected to slow down anytime soon. If you’d like to make digital transformation for your company real too, here’s a guide to saving on cloud computing services.

Cloud computing can save you money

Compared to on-premise solutions, cloud provides you with a lot of benefits. The costs associated with on-premise software can be dramatically higher than cloud solutions. On top of that, cloud computing services often come with the whole package—management, maintenance, and support.

What is on-premise software?

On-premise software, just as the name suggests, runs completely within the boundaries of your business. You need to set up your hardware and infrastructure yourself. The main advantage of on-premise software is the fact that your IT staff has constant physical access to the machines. This is a much more traditional approach to such systems, and it’s quickly becoming outdated. To launch such software, you’ll need a license, a qualified IT department, and a data centre.

Possible cost savings

• Scalability
  Scaling up with external cloud computing is much more convenient than with on-premise systems. Setting up your own infrastructure is a challenge in and of itself, and spending a big chunk of your budget on further growth is another problem. There’s no such thing with cloud computing, as you simply need to ask for more cloud storage or features, which you get almost immediately. You’re charged for what you use, and there’s no need for a large capital investment on your part.
  
  
• No need for hiring an entire IT team
  Management of on-premise server infrastructure is a huge task and requires additional employees. On top of that, these employees need to specialise in particular systems, which makes finding good professionals even harder. It’s not a particularly large niche, and so there isn’t that much talent to choose from, especially if you’re looking for in-house, non-remote workers. Cloud services allow you to free up your employees from tedious management tasks, too. This, in turn, lets you shift their focus to more pressing issues like growth and innovation for your enterprise.
  
  
• You don’t need your own servers
  On-premise software requires hardware, too. You’ll need some storage to keep it all in one place; this is associated with energy costs as well. While the security is improved compared to cloud computing, that’s a marginal benefit, since external servers are getting better and better at safety measurements. Even though you get to be in complete control of your data, somebody has to manage it. Again, setting up a new space if you run out of storage takes time and resources as well. Cloud takes the tedium right out of it.
  
  
• Your data is safe
  With cloud services your data and infrastructure are safe. It is certified and provides an opportunity to store all the information you need (including personal and medical data) in a secure way. When deciding to go with the cloud you no longer have to worry about adjusting your data centre to specific requirements.
  
  
• Better analytics 
  On-premise systems most often lack the ability to quickly analyse the immense amounts of data you have. Conversely, cloud computing services are equipped with analytics tools that can provide you with invaluable insights. This, in turn, makes the process much more effective and streamlined.

Serverless Model 

The name serverless comes from the fact that you don’t have to manage your backend servers. It consists of you running your processes, tasks, and applications on the cloud infrastructure, and the provider doing the maintenance for you. Still, the whole infrastructure runs on physical servers, it’s just that you don’t have to manage them.

The primary advantage of the serverless model is the fact that it uses pay as you use pricing model. There are no fixed prices and capital costs, you’re only charged for the computing resources that you’ve utilised. As you scale up, extra space is allocated automatically and the provider simply charges you for any additional computing power that you’ve used at the same rate. Seeing that serverless cloud providers allow you to build agile applications on their infrastructure, responding to any new conditions becomes almost instantaneous. If you need to quickly increase your cloud computing bandwidth, you’re free to do so at any time.

Still, serverless computing is not ideal, even though it might seem like it. For instance, it becomes much tougher to predict the exact figures you’re going to be spending on the cloud service. Due to the fact that it’s auto-scalable, you might easily go overboard with your expenses.

Dev/test cost reduction

Cloud computing is also beneficial when it comes to Dev/test environment. These are the first departments that you move to the cloud. If you’re still on the fence about moving to the cloud, Dev/test apps are perfect for testing the cloud provider. At times, Dev/test remains underfunded, as the majority of the budget goes to the more essential things, especially in terms of hardware needs.

Since cloud computing is easily scalable and you pay what you use, it becomes an excellent space for Dev/test conditions. Additionally, Dev/test usage is most often irregular. A developer might test some code, scrape it, then write it again and repeat the process a few times. Doing that via on-premise infrastructure involves using your resources assigned to different things such as operations.

Another benefit of using cloud for Dev/test is the cost-effectiveness. You can save money by turning the system off when you’re not using it. With on-premise systems you can’t really do that, as that’s your infrastructure that needs to operate continuously.

Lastly, the flexibility of creating Dev/test environments is an added bonus. Cloud computing allows you to create and remove entire systems in the blink of an eye. Since these environments are mostly used for testing, they don’t usually have a very long lifespan.

Wrap-Up

IT services are constantly evolving and one of the products of said evolution is cloud computing. It has gotten so popular that soon no company will pass on the chance to take part in the digital transformation movement. Moving to the cloud is an essential element, and so we can assume that the growth won’t stop in the coming years. On the contrary—we believe that it will accelerate even further, up to a point where there are no more businesses to conduct cloud migration.

If you’d like to know more about how to implement cloud in your organisation and use its full potential contact us!