Many IT organizations are still trying to wrap their heads around how to properly move to the cloud.  When it comes to Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), AWS and Azure have a great line of products and services.  Here are some examples of where IaaS can be great!

1. Active Directory

Leverage AWS or Azure to provide redundancy to your Active Directory environment. It is easy to spin up a virtual server in the cloud and setup a VPN to your on-premise network. This is a great way to provide fault tolerance to a critical system without investing into a colocation and expensive hardware.

2. Temporary workloads (Systems that don’t need to run 24×7)

A great example of a temporary workload came from one of JNT TEK’s clients.  This client is a financial services firm specializing in mortgages.  Each day, this firm would need to run a complex statistical modeling software to price out the interest rates for the loans they would sell that day. This software requires a lot of computing power while it runs, which would only be for a few hours.  Once it finished running it would not be needed until the next day. Rather than purchasing expensive hardware that would only be used a few hours a day, we advised them to leverage AWS.  JNT’s engineers created an automated system that would turn the servers on when needed and shut them down when they were not. The client would only pay for the hours the computers were in use.

3. Disaster Recovery

AWS & Azure can be a great platform for business continuity in case of a disaster or system failure.  There is no reason to have expensive hardware sitting idle in an expensive data center when IaaS can be leveraged to pay only when you need the hardware, which would only be during a recovery situation.  Testing can also be done by only paying for the hours used for the tests themselves.

4. Too Small to Build Your Own Data center

Many startups and smaller businesses should be taking advantage of IaaS.  Whether it’s for their Active Directory servers, Remote Desktop Servers, or other applications, IaaS provides benefits that cannot be achieved if a company has a small IT footprint.

  • AWS & Azure have multiple data centers and provide fault tolerant systems
  • Bandwidth and connectivity are superior in most cases in the cloud
  • Reduce risk by removing the single point of failure of having 1 server at an office
  • Recovery time is often faster in the cloud
  • Security systems are typically far superior in the cloud compared to what is setup at a smaller company
  • Lower upfront capital costs by using the cloud’s pay as you go model

5. Web Applications

Companies that host internal or external facing applications should really consider moving more towards cloud technology. The rate of innovation and key services can offer enough value that the decision is is easy. Of course, this always depends on the application and use case.  Especially for external (client) facing applications, it will often make sense to use cloud technology and IaaS.

  • In most cases, bandwidth and connectivity are superior in the cloud
  • Services for automation and scalability are built into the platform
  • Segment your internal data from customer data
  • Lower upfront capital costs by using the cloud’s pay as you go model
  • Scale faster and easier as your business grows

Written By
JNT TEK
818-456-0626
www.jnttek.com
sales@jnttek.com

Published On: July 30th, 2017Categories: Articles, Cloud

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