What is Cloud Cost Optimization?
Cloud cost optimisation is the practice of seeking and recognising mismanaged and wasted resources in order to reduce the amount one spends on their cloud storage. It is definitive that the less one pays, the greater Return on Investments. Cloud computing is one of the main areas where costs can be reduced and managed. The following information will outline the trends, analyses and strategies to use when lowering cloud computing costs through optimisation of records.
Cloud Cost Optimization Trends
Cloud computing usage trends allows people to see whether its usage is optimum for their company. Over the past years, there has been enough data to be able to identify patterns and statistics regarding cloud usage that will aid in the optimisation of cloud storage. The following are a few trends that have been seen in recent years:
1.Over-Budgeting
Companies that adopt cloud computing such as AWS, Azure, and Google often overbudget the cloud spend by 23%. This average overbudgeted spending is said to increase to 47% in the coming years. With the COVID-19 pandemic, the use of cloud storage is only predicted to increase rather than decrease or stay stable, which increases the chances of less than optimum cloud storing. There is an estimated 30% of costs wasted in cloud spend. Due to this, there has been an increase in optimising cloud storage by 73%. AWS cost optimization hence comes in handy.
2.Multi-Cloud Usage
Many companies use more than one cloud service. This is primarily a strategy, and it is often a choice between a hybrid and multi-cloud strategy. In which case, 93% use the former, and 87% use the latter. In addition to this, on average, enterprises use 2.2 public and private clouds.
3.Adopting Cloud Computing
When considering the sheer number of enterprises using cloud computing to store their important data, a whopping twelve million US dollars (870 million Indian rupees) are being spent per year on public clouds such as Google, AWS, and Azure. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is estimated that cloud storage usage will exceed previous plans by 59%.
Cloud Cost Optimization Analysis
Each cloud can be tracked individually and analysed for the above trends which can then be used to optimise one’s own cloud storage. A so-called “top-of-mind issue” is “analysing and understanding cost implications of running licensed software (52%), followed by the complexity of license rules in [a] public cloud (42%) and ensuring they are followed (42%).”
Cloud Cost Optimization Strategy
There are multiple AWS cost optimization strategies present now that cloud computing has been around for many years. The following are some strategies that reduce costs and optimizes data for a greater Return on Investment:
1.Decide between single-cloud and multi-cloud
Companies usually opt for multi-cloud storage to prevent vendor lock-in which improves the availability and uptime but risks losing volume discounts by vendors of a single cloud. It is noted that while money can be saved through a multi-cloud strategy, it may not counterbalance the cost of network traffic between clouds, the time taken to switch between the clouds, and the required training for staff to work the multiple clouds.
2.Root out idle resources
An example of an idle source is CPU utilization levels of up to five percent that can be considered a waste when a company is paying for one hundred percent of the cloud costs. As it is time ineffective and difficult to upload new resources into a data centre, take the time to instead make use of the autoscaling the cloud provides which allow the scaling up the computing power.
3.Root out unused or unattached resources
This is the easiest way to optimize a company’s cloud storage. By identifying and removing the resources that are no longer being used such as a server that was running for a particular function that has ended, the cloud storage is optimized. The company will hence not be charged for the use of these services. Forgetting to stop using services after that function has been achieved is quite common in IT industries, and is the first place to look when optimizing costs.
How do all of these points aid in cloud management?
By taking into consideration everything discussed above, AWS cost optimization will be much easier and approachable. Given that a company pays proper attention to the files and software services being used, money can be saved and cloud computing can be used to store all of their data. There is no right way of optimization and adopting the strategies that fit the company best will aid in cost optimization. It’s a process of trial and error that takes less time than expected.