As organizations increasingly adopt cloud platforms, it’s essential to understand both the technical and financial implications of these decisions.
A Smart Cloud Strategy
Today’s IT leaders, cloud architects, CTOs, and CFOs seek to optimize their cloud investments, by making smart decisions about the right cloud platform to power their computing environment — without overspending. This takes careful planning based on in-depth analysis to achieve immediate gains in efficiency and cost-savings, as well as designing a long-term cloud strategy for sustaining those gains.
Data Intensity has two proprietary assessments which provide business-critical data to inform the decision-making process: 1) the Cloud Platform Assessment, and 2) the Total Cost of Ownership for Transformation (TCOT) Assessment. This article highlights the differences and strengths of these assessment types to maximize ROI for your enterprise: one that supports the challenges of today and the future, with the growing complexity of AI-driven workflows, cybersecurity threats, and other risks when operating in the cloud.
In short, a TCOT shows you how to maximize your investments in Oracle, including cloud costs, Oracle Support costs, middleware, database, etc. A Cloud Platform Assessment helps you optimize cloud costs and performance for non-Oracle workloads.
Let’s dig into each of these in a bit more detail.
What is a Cloud Platform Assessment?
Overview
A Cloud Platform Assessment is critical to determining the ideal cloud provider to host your non-Oracle workloads and other software assets. This assessment compares the four major cloud platforms—Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), and Google Cloud Platform—to determine which would provide a seamless, optimized cloud experience. The Assessment focuses on evaluating the current cloud architecture, performance, security, and scalability to help identify gaps, weaknesses, and areas for improvement.
Key components
A Cloud Platform Assessment provides technical data via these methods:
- Cost analysis
- Cloud infrastructure evaluation
- Application interdependency mapping
- Performance analysis
- Security and compliance review
- Scalability and future-proofing
- Risk identification and mitigation
Benefits
A Cloud Platform Assessment delivers these value-added benefits:
- Ensures that cloud resources are being utilized efficiently
- Identifies areas for performance improvement and/or cost reduction
- Optimizes cloud operations for future business growth and changing demands
What is a Total Cost of Ownership for Transformation (TCOT) Assessment?
A Total Cost of Ownership for Transformation (TCOT) Assessment is a comprehensive evaluation designed to understand the full financial implications of migrating Oracle workloads from on-premises to a cloud platform or between cloud platforms. The TCOT not only calculates all potential costs associated with migrating your Oracle workloads, but it also predicts your costs over time, including migration costs, cloud costs, Oracle Support costs, and managed services costs, for three to five years.
Read this TCOT blog for more information on this dynamic assessment.
Benefits
A TCOT delivers these value-added benefits:
- Increases understanding of the true financial commitment of cloud adoption for Oracle
- Aids in budget planning and cloud financial governance
- Allows better decision-making in terms of ROI and long-term cost efficiency
You can learn more about TCO Transformation Assessments in this blog post.
Assessment Comparison
When compared side-by-side, the main assessment distinctions are as follows:
| TCO Transformation Assessment | Cloud Platform Assessment |
| Measures financial impact and cost-efficiency gains from initial cloud migration of Oracle workloads; primarily for on-prem environments deciding on a cloud strategy or moving Oracle between clouds.Includes cost optimization for Oracle applications, middleware, database, and annual maintenance. | An independent, full-stack analysis including applications, services, databases, operating systems, virtualization, network traffic, storage, end-of-life applications, and dormant applications. Shows current spend versus savings from making a cloud-to-cloud move or optimizing in place. |
Note that the assessments are complementary, rather than mutually exclusive approaches. If you have Oracle and non-Oracle workloads and are looking to migrate, you will typically receive both the TCOT and the Cloud Platform Assessment. For example, a Cloud Platform Assessment might identify ways to optimize workloads for better performance, while a TCOT would evaluate all the factors for Oracle, including application, middleware, database, and annual maintenance costs.
Three Essential Cloud Success Factors
Cloud-related choices are abounding and will continue to present more alternatives going forward. Consider these three factors, which will steer you toward successful cloud computing:
- Combine insights from a Cloud Platform Assessment with the optimization strategies from a TCOT Assessment. If you run Oracle workloads, the TCOT will provide optimization of your overall Oracle investment.
- Align technical and financial goals for sustainable growth and operational efficiency.
- Consider the results of both assessments to identify risks—technical and financial—and mitigate them before they impact your business.
How Data Intensity Can Help
As a Cloud Managed Services provider, Data Intensity offers expert guidance and hands-on assistance with both types of assessments. We analyze the results to recommend a data-driven strategy, from a technology and financial standpoint, before migrating apps to a new cloud platform or changing platforms. But we don’t stop there; we revisit your cloud choices over time for continuous optimization of the platform and associated costs. Our managed services also ensure your IT organization adapts to changing business needs while staying within budget.
For more information…
Cloud Platform Assessment datasheet
Cloud and Infrastructure Managed Services web page
Authored by: James White
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