The agile “pay as you go” model offered by cloud computing makes it possible to save costs because you only pay for what you use. However, this model also presents new challenges. Storm Reply offers financial operations for the optimal use of your cloud resources, and this at a minimal price.
Cloud infrastructures are based on a “pay as you go” model, which means that only the use of resources is paid for. This creates operating costs that cannot be completely predicted and are dependent on the application, traffic, corporate strategy, etc. Many companies now ask themselves how the costs for the cloud can be calculated for budget planning and how internal calculations can be performed.
With AWS, the main cost factors are distributed into computing, storage and networking. Along with user based payment methods, it is possible to reserve instances and to pay the complete sum or part of the costs ahead of time. In this way, 60% of the computing and storage costs can be saved. Even larger savings of up to 90% are made possible by the use of spot instances. Here you can make an offer for instances that are available on the spot market. If you are outbid, a message will be sent and the instance must be terminated within two minutes.
With a whitebox model, Storm Reply offers the continuous assessment of the loading of instances – depending on use and service requirements, traffic loads and times – and adapts the infrastructure accordingly. Together with the customer, decisions are made regarding the use of alternative price principles (RI, Spot). These price reductions are passed on to the customers. The Storm Reply financial operations continuously compare and correspondingly adapt budgets and forecasts in order to offer our customers the most cost-efficient solution.
AWS offers cost management tools that make it easier for users to estimate their AWS costs. The AWS total cost of operations calculator (TCO) compares the costs of a local or normal hosting environment with AWS over a period of 3 years. With the AWS Simple Monthly Calculator it is possible to calculate the likely monthly AWS costs with the detailed entry of the requirements (e.g. region, type of instance, type and size of the external memory, size of the snapshots, GiB Traffic In and Out, number of VPNs etc.). The AWS Trusted Advisor can be used to monitor the AWS Services and estimate the possible cost savings. The Trusted Advisor makes recommendations for cost optimization, security, fault tolerance and performance improvement. Beyond this, the AWS Cost Explorer offers a detailed analysis of the historic AWS costs according to API operation, availability zone, services, cost allocation tags, instance type, price model (RI, spot) and region. AWS Budgets and Forecast generate predictions or estimations of the AWS costs for up to 3 months. Here it is also possible to determine individualized monthly budgets as well as to set up messages and alarms when the preset costs are exceeded.