Nowadays, many organizations are moving additional resources to the cloud. And with that, cloud costs are becoming a large part of IT budgets. Over time, this will continue to grow and if you don’t have the right governance in place. Undeniably things can get out of control quite quick and easily. There are a couple of easy ways / solutions to implement basic Azure cost saving / optimization options. Some even form an integral part of Azure’s pricing structure.

Azure 101: Choose the right payment option for your needs.

— Floris Klaver, Optimization Consultant & Co-Owner LicenseQ
Primary payment options for Azure
  • Pay-as-you-go – Although PAYG is the most flexible option, giving you the ability to add infrastructure on demand, it can also be the most expensive.
  • Reserved Instances – Besides PAYG, this type of payment requires an upfront commitment of between 1-3 years, but as with any bulk purchases, can land you a sweet deal (up to 70% off).
  • Spot instances – Also Spot Instances can be very interesting. This type of payment is designed to utilize unused compute capacity. To clarify: These can be suspended at any time, are best for projects that aren’t time-bound. Similar to reserved instances, the Azure cost savings to be made here are great – up to 90% reduction!
How to save costs on Azure
  • Utilize Hybrid Benefits (if available)
  • Make use of dev/test pricing
  • Move away from traditional databases
  • Right-Sizing Virtual Machines
  • Switch workloads to containers
  • Make use of storage tiering
  • Base VMs stop/start schedule on your usage
LicenseQ Optimization Services

Through our Azure Optimization Service, we analyze your current cloud usage and cost. The service is set up to identify room for improvement in your cloud environment, to optimize your spend, and reduce costs. We look at your actual consumption and optimizations in detail to make sure they align with your business needs. This service includes:

  • Cloud cost review + report
  • Data analysis
  • Optional cross platform analysis (Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform)
  • Find quick wins
  • In-depth optimization plan

Obviously things can get rather complex and time consuming very quickly. Our service aims to support you pro-actively. We focus on the driving factors of your cloud consumption cost, the current fit of your cloud to your actual needs, and an actual cloud baseline, including insights on your current use, pricing and usage. You will be able to optimize your cloud environment, reduce cost and complexity, and better align to your actual business needs. It will also provide insights into using your former on-premises investments, leveraging services like reserved instance, and the cost of business as usual.

Furhermore, if contracts can or need to be optimized, we also offer contract negotiation support to work towards a successful new contract.

More information

Lastly, if you want to learn even more: Please visit our YouTube channel and our LinkedIn company page and subscribe to stay up to date. We post regularly free and unbiased publicly available information and video’s. So you can to be prepared as much as possible for your next purchase, contract renewal or other (mid-term) negotiations wit Microsoft.