ONUG’s Co-Founder and Co-Chair Nick Lippis, in his January 2023 blog post, stated directly that “the IT Spend Party is over”. 2023 will usher in a period of flat spending and a desire to optimize and contain IT and cloud costs while still scaling infrastructures to meet business needs. Enterprises will undergo optimization exercises to utilize the capital investments that were made over the past three years of rapid growth. 

 Balancing cloud scalability and security with cost containment requires careful planning and management along with careful selection of the right cloud provider that offers the right combination of scalability, security and cost-effectiveness. AWS with their Cost Explorer along with Microsoft’s Azure Cost Management tool that helps enterprises optimize their cloud spending are making inroads. Google’s Cloud Cost Management tool is also effective in helping enterprises monitor and control their spend. Beyond the tools offered by the Cloud Service Providers there are platforms that include CloudCheckr, RightScale and Cloudability, a cloud cost management tool that helps enterprises visualize and control spending. 

Using Automation is another way to cut costs by reducing manual intervention, minimizing errors and increasing efficiency. Today’s  automation platforms help companies reduce cloud expenditures by optimizing their cloud resource usage, some of these include: 

• AWS Auto Scaling: An AWS service that automatically adjusts the number of Amazon EC2 instances based on demand, helping to reduce cloud costs.
• Microsoft Azure Autoscale: A feature of Microsoft Azure that automatically increases or decreases the number of virtual machines based on demand, helping to reduce cloud costs.
• Google Cloud Autoscaling: A feature of Google Cloud that automatically increases or decreases the number of virtual machines based on demand, helping to reduce cloud costs.
• ParkMyCloud: A platform that automatically optimizes cloud resource utilization by identifying and removing idle or underutilized resources, reducing waste and increasing cost savings.
• CloudHealth: A cloud management platform that helps companies optimize their cloud spending by providing cost visibility and recommending cost optimization strategies.

• CloudBolt: A cloud management platform that helps companies automate cloud resource deployment and management, reducing manual effort and increasing cost savings.
• SaltStack: An automation platform that helps companies manage cloud infrastructure and applications, reducing manual effort and increasing cost savings.

At ONUG Spring in Dallas, May 17-18, we will continue this discussion when Cigna, in partnership with AWS, will be discussing their cloud deployment strategy and how they balanced the need for scalability and security with cost containment. They will also discuss the controls and processes they implemented to manage their cloud environment, drive efficiency and deliver business value. You may sign up to join this discussion here.