One size doesn’t always fit all – Our 5 key questions to find your perfect cloud solution

This from Craig Such, Azzure IT Managing Director…

Cloud business solutions aren’t one size fit all, and they all bring different benefits to different businesses. Many solutions providers, such as Microsoft Dynamics 365, will offer the option of hosting your cloud software in a public or private environment. Both of these options can be the ideal solution for a business, but it is all about finding out which solution is the right fit for your business. At Azzure IT, we have come up with 5 key questions to answer to help you find your perfect cloud solution, whether that be public or private:

How many tenants do I want on my system?
If your business is looking to use its ERP solution to manage a number of different companies, then you will need a multi-tenant system, as it allows you to seamlessly interlink each company to each other. A single tenant solution only allows you to operate one company.

How quick do I want the project to be?
Public cloud projects are often much quicker than private cloud, due to the nature of the hosting service. Public cloud solutions can be up and running in a few days, as the software is ready out the box and is hosted on Microsoft’s server. It is just a case singing into the server and you’re ready to begin!

Private cloud solutions are installed and run in a unique environment for each customer. It is a single SaaS environment, fully designed for that specific business. This means that the process of designing, installing, customising a private cloud solution will naturally take longer than a public cloud solution, but the resulting solution well be a perfect fit for your business.

How much customisation do I want to have?
If your business is looking for a straight out-the-box and ready to use ERP solution, then public cloud is the way to go. While it does offer limited customisation capabilities, it gives you the full power of an ERP solution as soon as it is installed, and will not take any development time to get started. It also only take a few days to setup and get running, so it does not take any time away from your business’s operating hours, and is not an inconvenience. Public cloud solutions also allow you a lot of scalability, letting you start off with a completely out-the-box solution that you can add more onto as your business continues to grow.

However, if your business is looking for a fully bespoke built, customisable solution that is in line with your business processes and hosted in the cloud and not on-premise, then cloud software can do that too. The private cloud gives you much more flexibility, as your organisation can customise its cloud environment to meet its specific business needs. It also still offers all the scalability of a public cloud solution, letting you start off small and slowly build and add more to as your business, as its requirements continue to grow.

How much maintenance do I want to do to my system?

With the public cloud, you have practically no maintenance to worry about. Your service provider provides the maintenance for you. A vast network of servers ensures against failure and provides you with the highest levels of reliability. Public cloud also ensures that updates are installed automatically onto your system without there being any need for your system to go offline or be restarted.

With private cloud, you can choose when you want to install updates and new versions, we have access to fix any issues you may encounter, and we can provide any levels of customisation or integration you require.

Also, private cloud solutions offer a higher level of security, as resources are not shared with others, so higher levels of control and security are possible. With a private, single tenant solution, the chance of one user accidently accessing another’s data is essentially eliminated. In a single tenant environment, you also have more control over backups and recovery because the system is backed up to one dedicated part of the SaaS server. On the other hand, in a multi-tenancy public cloud environment, this process is much more long-winded to the point that it’s not always available to users.

Do I want to pay all in one go or on subscription?

Public cloud is available on subscription only, which means a cheaper cost per user because all the resources are shared. Because of this, multi-tenancies operate a maximum resource usage, which makes for optimum efficiency.

Private cloud is available on either a subscription or perpetual full licence deal, giving you the flexibility to choose how you want to pay.

No matter what requirements you have, there is a Microsoft Dynamics cloud solution available, and as a Microsoft Gold Partner, Azzure IT can help your business achieve its goals.

https://www.azzure-it.com

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