Planning a move to Azure
Whether you’re planning a move to Azure to reduce your costs or want more flexibility and performance, the Microsoft Cloud offers a great deal of potential. Migrating isn’t simple though. There are many pitfalls that you can run into. Having a good plan in place and a full understanding of your objectives from the start helps avoid most issues and makes the transition to the cloud more straightforward.
Azure was developed with enterprise IT in mind. It was designed to integrate with other Microsoft products such as Office and Exchange and popular business applications from the start. As such, the configuration of the Azure cloud for a business is intended to provide a familiar environment that works well and provides all the features such as instant back up and resilience that are required in a typical modern IT Strategy.
What Planning a Move to Azure entails
When you’re planning a move to the cloud, there are some questions that you’ll want to talk through with your Azure Consultant. These range from governance through to budget, and getting the right answers for your business needs will help ensure that your move is beneficial.
How Much Does It Cost?
The simple answer is that when you move to Azure, the cost of your cloud will vary over time. Supplier prices can change based on things like exchange rate, but the level of consumption that you have will also grow. Many businesses come to Valto with an existing cloud environment and are seeing ever increasing bills. While we can help to reduce Azure Costs, it’s important to know that the price you pay at the start when you’re moving a small number of applications and data is not the same as your subscription a year later.
Unlike a traditional legacy server where you buy the equipment and then it’s there whether you’re using it or not, your cloud bill reflects actual consumption. In the long run the cost is lower – if you optimise your usage and keep track of what subscriptions you’re running.
How much do you know?
There is a massive shortage of experienced IT staff with a full understanding of the process of planning a move to Azure. While the deployment and management of Azure is now straightforward and familiar, there are nuances with machine spec and architecture that require expertise.
Having access to experienced support staff is essential. Microsoft’s own support can be difficult to use – and comes at a cost. Choosing a managed service for Azure is a worthwhile investment that will pay off the first time you have an issue with backups or identity.
How Secure Is it?
Azure is secure. If you take precautions. Modern business doesn’t take place in the office – we access sensitive data via multiple devices and through multiple networks. This can be a recipe for vulnerabilities.
Securing your data is essential, so ensuring that identities and permissions are properly managed, using a firewall, and maintaining best practice security are all recommended. Regular Pen testing will also help to identify any risks and take appropriate action.
If you’re thinking about planning a move to Azure, or want advice about your existing deployment, please contact a member of our team on 03335 779 009 and we’ll be happy to talk to you.
