What are the benefits and advantages of moving to the cloud?
The benefits of cloud technology can be sliced and diced in countless ways, but some of the most frequently cited advantages include:
Increased flexibility and agility
The cloud makes you more flexible and agile in a number of ways. Cloud-based software and infrastructure make it easy to adopt new technology faster. Applications remain current. New applications can be deployed quickly across organizations. Your organization can quickly scale as needed to accommodate change — and you can support a more distributed, anytime, anywhere workforce.
Stronger security and disaster recovery
Leading cloud providers run extensive programs across all layers of security, with dedicated staff and a greater body of expertise than would be practical for most businesses. With data securely backed up in redundant locations and applications accessible via an internet connection (and typically usable offline until a connection can be established), operations don’t come to a halt if a natural disaster strikes a data center, or employees must suddenly shift work to a new or remote location.
Cost benefits
A cloud solution removes the costs of an on-premises or self-hosted data centers, and allows staff to focus on IT needs to grow a business instead of procurement, configuration, maintenance and security duties. A key cloud benefit is scalability — you can change capacity without worrying about the expense of over-provisioning servers and avoid the risk of underestimating needed capacity. For businesses without data centers and a large IT staff, the SaaS pricing model is a game changer, providing access to highly advanced software that was once only available to those with vast resources.
In addition to flexibility, security and cost, the cloud opens opportunities to drive innovation. Cloud-enabled organizations can build new solutions faster, optimize business processes and adapt to changing markets quickly, which puts them in a better position to compete.
CAPEX vs. OPEX
When deploying in the cloud, monthly operational expenses (OPEX) are the primary expenditure, and they’re quite predictable. That makes full cloud adoption easier to budget for than on-premises or hybrid setups, and in many cases, the expense is easier to get approved. With an on-premises application, capital expenditures (CAPEX) could include buying equipment, paying for software licensing and maintaining the hardware in top shape, which can be both unpredictable and expensive.