6 Top Business Benefits You’ll Gain in the Cloud
The appetite for cloud-based services has never been bigger.
According to Gartner, “IT spending is accelerating ahead of revenue expectations” this year, with the IT services segment among the top three growth areas due, in large part, to IaaS public cloud spending. That’s no surprise given the enormous growth of the public cloud market over the last year as companies look to build more scalable, agile infrastructure on the cloud in response to the pandemic and shift to remote work models.
Any hesitancy in the past over moving mission-critical workloads off-premises is giving way to the realization that the public cloud is core to digital transformation efforts. Today, companies not only want to benefit from the significant cost and performance benefits of the public cloud, but also the opportunity to drive innovation and take full advantage of automation, AI and other cloud technologies to address complex use cases.
Here’s a look at six of the biggest benefits your business will realize in the cloud.
1. Significant Cost Savings
There’s a reason cost savings is the most talked-about benefit associated with cloud migration. Implementing, managing and maintaining on-premises infrastructure is expensive.
First, you’re tied to a capital expenditure (CapEx) model, which means a significant upfront investment in hardware, followed by continuous maintenance and upgrade expenses. Then, you also have to consider the fact that on-premises infrastructures are built to peak consumption, so you’re likely paying for capacity you aren’t using (and you have little-to-no opportunity to quickly scale in the event that you do need more capacity). And, when you add in other important factors—such as software licensing costs, software support costs, rent checks, electricity bills, power and cooling costs and labor expenses—managing and maintaining on-premises infrastructure can cost a small (or large) fortune.
Here’s the good news: the public cloud provides organizations with an opportunity to break free from the financial constraints of CapEx by moving to an operational expenditure (OpEx) model, which is based on monthly consumption-based pricing. The OpEx model works much like the way you’re billed for home electricity usage. When you turn the lights on, you’re paying for electricity. But, when you turn the lights off, you’re no longer incurring expenses. Similarly, in the cloud, each month you pay for only the cloud infrastructure you use—and you can turn resources on and off at will.
All of these benefits add up to big cost savings. In fact, one Navisite customer, Xtime, saved $250,000 annually on data center costs by moving to the cloud.
2. Limitless Scalability
Another top benefit of the cloud is that it eliminates the need to buy infrastructure based on what you think your company’s maximum capacity needs will be—instead, you can dynamically scale up or down as business requirements change in a matter of minutes. This is a stark contrast to the process required to add capacity on-premises, which typically entails a complex, time-consuming and costly upgrade to your IT infrastructure.
For example, PHI Helipass and its core services were powered by an on-premises database. However, as the business continued to grow, it needed an IT environment that could scale with demand. PHI Helipass ultimately moved its database to the cloud, giving the company scalability to easily support future growth.
3. Increased Productivity
With on-premises environments, IT teams are responsible for a long list of tasks. You have to deploy new hardware, upgrade existing hardware, handle routine maintenance tasks, monitor activity, troubleshoot issues and manually implement software patches and updates. The list goes on. It’s no wonder that research from INAP reveals many IT leaders and professionals (59% of those surveyed, in fact) are frustrated by the amount of time they spend on routine tasks related to IT infrastructure.
One of the biggest benefits of the cloud is that it removes the burden of ongoing management—because there are no servers or specialized hardware that you need to maintain. And for the other routine tasks—like implementing software updates, manually running processes or troubleshooting issues—you can outsource many of those day-to-day responsibilities, freeing up your IT team to focus on the highest-value tasks for your business.
For example, after Penske Australia and New Zealand migrated its legacy ERP solution to the cloud, the company saw a major positive impact on the productivity of its IT staff—the team could now focus on important initiatives that deliver business value, rather than spending time worrying about managing a massive legacy system.
4. More Innovation
Innovation is at the core of staying competitive in today’s business world, but on-premises technology can sometimes stand in the way. Legacy infrastructure can be too rigid and costly to keep up with the rapid pace of innovation needed in today’s digital landscape—and oftentimes, the deployment of new software, features and capabilities in an on-premises environment can take as long as 12-to-18 months.
In contrast, cloud providers are always innovating and incorporating the latest and greatest technologies as they emerge. So, by moving to the cloud, you can take advantage of cutting-edge features and capabilities—and you can do so without time-consuming development cycles or a major financial investment. Additionally, you can deploy the latest features and updates as quickly as they’re released, without disruptive downtime. This gives you the flexibility to deploy what you need when you need it. In fact, resources can be spun up in minutes, rather than months.
In business terms, this means faster time to market, the ability to innovate and pivot on-demand and a way to differentiate from competitors—all of which will you help you grow your company’s bottom line. It makes sense, then, to learn that 75% of the cloud’s predicted value comes from its ability to boost innovation within organizations.
5. Enhanced Security
For a while, it was a common perception that company data and infrastructure is safer with an on-premises solution than in the cloud. Today, however, that mindset is changing: According to the 2020 Oracle and KPMG Cloud Threat Report, 40% of survey respondents “view public clouds as much more secure than what they can deliver with their on-premises environment.”
The reasoning? Cloud providers make it their top priority to carefully monitor security, ensure compliance and keep their customers’ data safe—and they have resources solely dedicated to this vital task. When it comes to safeguarding on-premises environments, however, many organizations include security as just one of many IT responsibilities—making it easy to neglect this priority altogether.
For example, Kallik wanted to move its proprietary business management platform and 100% of its customers to a cloud-based solution that would future-proof its operations. After moving to the cloud, Kallik and its customers benefited from strengthened security and regulatory compliance thanks to the platform’s highly secure infrastructure.
Here are a few additional ways cloud providers ensure your business will benefit from enhanced security:
- Identity and access: Enterprise-level cloud identity governance helps manage access for end users (e.g., multi-factor authentication and single sign-on access).
- Data protection: Encryption is used to secure data in transit. By scrambling the content of any system, database or file, data can’t be accessed in a readable format, even if it is intercepted while in transfer online. This makes it nearly impossible for any unauthorized user to access your data.
- Network security: Virtual machines and data are isolated from unauthorized traffic and users. Users can only access data through encrypted or private connections.
- Threat defense: Continuous monitoring and analysis of traffic will reveal any anomalies and threats to your data.
6. Streamlined Data Analytics
Hidden within millions of bits of data generated from your customer transactions and business processes are priceless, actionable insights that can help you make better, more informed decisions.
But getting your hands on those business-changing insights can be extremely challenging—especially when operating on-premises. It requires manual labor to sift through volumes of data, analyze relevant information and then derive value from the findings. Most companies don’t have the expertise, time or resources to devote to these tasks—especially when their IT staff is too bogged down in “keep-the-lights-on” activities.
With the cloud, however, taking advantage of advanced analytics—especially around technologies like AI, machine learning, and robotic process automation—is now a realistic and viable option for near-term digital transformation projects. And this is all made possible by cloud providers that offer accessible and user-friendly analytics tools. Until recently, if you wanted to add ML to your analytics workloads, you would have had to hire a data scientist to manage the process. Today, tools like Amazon SageMaker and Azure Machine Learning Studio are within reach of typical IT department personnel with a computer science background—no PhD required.
All of these cloud capabilities put real-time and actionable data at your fingertips, so you have the information you need, when you need it, to strategically transform your business the right way. It’s no surprise, then, to learn that Gartner predicts that public cloud services will be essential for 90% of data and analytics innovation by 2022.
The Cloud-Native Future is Here
More and more companies are moving to the cloud because it allows them to modernize their business to better meet today’s changing business dynamics—all while taking advantage of powerful cloud-native benefits that aren’t found on-premises.
Between the cost savings, increased productivity, deep data analysis and the myriad of other business benefits that come with your modernization journey, can your company afford not to move to the cloud? Learn how Navisite’s cloud migration services can help you start your journey today.
Do you want to learn how to leverage the benefits of the cloud faster? Check out our on-demand webinar, “Quick Wins and Practical Moves That Will Get You to Cloud Success,” to discover how to achieve immediate and long-term gains in the cloud.