Clearing Up Cloud Cost Confusion

There always seems to be some confusion about whether cloud computing really saves companies money.  This is due, in large part, to the fact that no two companies, or two deployments, are the same – so it’s hard to draw a clear comparison or establish any patterns.

Why are cloud deployments so variable?  Well, because it includes factors like management, optimization, and additional plug-ins in addition to the complication of trying to compare cloud investments with traditional IT investments.  So, you can see, it quickly gets complicated and confusing.

According to James Staten, a researcher for Forrester, one way to help you save costs with a SaaS or cloud solution is to avoid some of these hidden costs:

1. Customization — The more you can use the SaaS solution “out-of-the-box,” as it was designed, the lower your costs will be.
2. Integration — Integrating your SaaS solutions with in-house applications, data stores and other SaaS services is inevitable and shouldn’t be avoided. A suggested best practice is to define a clear integration architecture via as few means as possible.
3. Sprawl — A SaaS app that is a great investment for 15 employees may not be a great investment when you roll it out to 1,500 employees, so be aware of how your user counts are affecting your cost savings.
4. Forgetting to turn things off — It’s easy to see how pay per use makes your start-up costs low and scaling as traffic rises easy. But it goes both ways – don’t forget to turn off resources you no longer needed.
5. Storage grows, it never shrinks — Actively manage storage consumption by moving data to lower cost services when they are no longer in constant use, leveraging caching as much as possible and deleting files or copies of files if you don’t need them.
6. Not making the most of cloud economics — Not every application is a good fit for a pay-per-use platform. Make sure that you are only considering cloud solutions that enable you to scale to exactly what you will use (elastic scale) or can be turned off without charge when not in use (transiency).

Our Cloud ERP and Cloud CRM solutions are designed to help you avoid these pitfalls and experience real, quantifiable cost savings.  To learn more about how a cloud business management solution could save you money, request a Cloud Impact Assessment!

Source:  Forrester, February 18, 2013

HIPAA Compliant Cloud Computing for Healthcare Organizations

With the vast amount of changes in healthcare regulations, it may have been easy to overlook a portion of the new HIPAA Privacy, Security, Enforcement and Breach Rules that related to cloud computing.  Because these rules apply to any person or entity that “creates, receives, maintains, or transmits” any private health information, that means they apply to cloud service providers who are now considered “business associates” of the healthcare clients in the eyes of HIPAA.

If you are a healthcare organization working with Socius or another cloud provider, you need to be aware that your cloud provider must commit to a business associate agreement to comply with the Breach Notification Rule – The cloud computing service provider must also agree to yearly HIPAA audits and that its staff must be trained on cloud data security. Policies and procedures of the cloud provider must also be in accordance with the HIPAA security guidelines.

As a result, both the cloud computing firm and the healthcare company are liable for any violations against the HIPAA rules.  Likewise, you as the covered healthcare company are also directly responsible for every action of your cloud computing provider.

I share this with you not to scare you away from doing business in the cloud, because the cloud can be highly efficient and cost effective place for you to move your health records, but to encourage you to take extra care when selecting cloud providers.

If you have any questions about Socius Cloud Solutions or our ability to comply with HIPAA regulations, please contact us today!

Source:  CloudTimes, January 24, 2013

Are These Business Challenges Paving Your Way to the Cloud?

As a business decision maker, you know the challenges that your organization is facing better than anyone.  Have any of these concerns been weighing on your mind?

• We aren’t always able to respond quickly to market demands.
• We need to reduce overhead costs.
• We need to operate in real time to meet 24-hour demand.
• We need to deliver services to remote offices or workers.
• Our growth depends on our implementation of new technology.
• We’re undergoing a merger or acquisition.
• The scale of our operations is going to change.
• We want to expand into new markets.
• We’d like to focus our efforts on our core competencies.
• We need to focus only on mission-critical activities.
• We’re experiencing dynamic business growth but have a hiring freeze.

If so, the solution may be closer than you think.  By deploying your business management software in the cloud, you can address and eliminate all of these concerns.  A cloud based ERP or CRM solution can help you:

• Adapt quickly and make changes to your solution and processes easily so that you can respond to market demands or internal changes.
• Give your people anywhere, anytime access to the information they need.
• Implement new technology without upfront hardware costs or ongoing system maintenance.
• Focus on your business while a trusted partner ensures that your systems are up and running efficiently.

To find out if a cloud business solution is right for your organization, request a Cloud Impact Assessment from Socius today!

Do Security Concerns Have You Looking to the Cloud?

You know that the security of your business systems and data is paramount, but actually securing them isn’t always easy.  If security questions have you looking to heavens for answers, you are looking in the right direction because the answer could be “the cloud.”

Cloud providers are required to maintain certain levels of security and are accountable to governing organizations as well as their clients.  It is essential for cloud providers to have a level of expertise in securing data that is typical higher than most internal IT departments do, meaning that data is often safer from electronic and environmental threats in the cloud than it is in most company’s server rooms. By deploying your business management software solutions in the cloud, it frees up your IT resources from the constant focus on security so that they can address other areas of the organization where they can add value.

Are you constantly worried about:

• the security of your data?
• the security of your transactions?
• the security of your communications?
• your ability to keep up with the latest security threats?
• complying with privacy or security regulations?

If so, then you can gain some piece of mind by meeting with our Cloud Services team to learn how a cloud ERP or CRM business solution can affect the security of your critical data.  Request a Cloud Impact Assessment today!

7 IT Concerns that May Make a Move to Cloud in 2013 Ideal

IT can be the source of many challenges for organizations in a variety of circumstances.  Fortunately, the Cloud offers organizations facing these challenges a means of lessening the IT burden while still leveraging up-to-date and leading-edge business software solutions.

The Cloud may be an ideal solution for your organization if you find yourself saying any of the following:

• We’re having difficulty staffing qualified IT professionals.
• Staying up to date with evolving technologies is difficult for us.
• Maintaining current hardware and software is time consuming.
• We need to upgrade our infrastructure.
• We need to relocate our infrastructure.
• We need to implement a global IT network, but we lack the resources.
• We need to maintain our current IT capabilities but are downsizing.

Socius Cloud Solutions will implement and maintain your ERP or CRM business solutions, freeing your IT staff to bring additional value to your business in other areas. We’ll also remove the burden of maintaining your own servers by hosting your critical business data in our secure environment which has over 99.5% uptime.

If you want to learn more about how a Cloud ERP or CRM solution from Socius Cloud Services can benefit your business, request a Cloud Impact Assessment today!

Trusting the Transparent Cloud

Like anything in business, cloud computing comes with both benefits and risks.  According to Microsoft’s whitepaper, The Microsoft Approach to Cloud Transparency, “the opportunity offered by cloud computing requires balancing the benefits of moving data, processing, and capacities to the cloud with the implications of data security, privacy, reliability, and regulatory requirements.”

So how can you be sure that your cloud services provider can be trusted to balance those factors?

One of the best ways to determine whether or not you can trust your cloud provider is to get third-party validation of their security practices and privacy procedures.

Gene Phifer, vice president distinguished analyst for Gartner, gave this advice, “Enterprises should ensure that potential cloud service providers are trustworthy in areas of security, privacy and operational characteristics – Transparency in a cloud vendor is key and security should be as big of a concern with online deployments as with on-premises deployments.”

Microsoft has taken steps to be as transparent as possible so that you can trust them as a cloud provider – whether you are using Windows Azure, Office 365, or Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online.

• They have posted self-assessments for all three of their cloud services on the Cloud Security Alliance’s  Security, Trust & Assurance Registry (STAR)
• When engaging customers, Microsoft provides documentation that specifies Microsoft-shared responsibilities with regard to applications and data that customers entrust to them; such documentation is essential for organizations that have regulatory or compliance obligations.
• They have proactively responded to the extensive list of privacy and security questions that the Cloud Security Alliance recommends you ask a potential cloud services provider and made those answers available to the public.
• They launched The Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online Trust Center so that you have a one-stop shop for all of the privacy, security, and compliance information about their cloud CRM solution.

Microsoft is striving to be an industry leader in transparency for all of their cloud services so that you can feel confident trusting your critical business data to their cloud.

If you feel ready to trust the Microsoft cloud, get started with Office 365 or Dynamics CRM Online today!

Still not sure cloud services are for you?  Request a Cloud Impact Assessment today!

13 Ways to Improve Your Luck with ERP in the Cloud

Cloud Computing can seem like a big, intimidating unknown, especially when it comes to trusting “the cloud” with the critical business data in your ERP solution. So why would anyone do it?

Well, there are a number of reasons that a Cloud ERP solution could be a very beneficial choice for an organization. In honor of it being Friday the 13^th, here are our top 13 benefits that businesses can expect from ERP in the Cloud:

1. Cost Savings – Reduce capital costs by avoiding the purchase of hardware to host your ERP system while eliminating some operating expenses such as IT support for your ERP system and the power needed to run your server equipment.
2. Reduce Your Dependence on IT – By hosting your ERP application in the cloud, common help desk calls and other IT management tasks like procurement and server configuration are reduced, freeing your IT staff to concentrate their talents on tasks that will improve the business and revenue generation rather than on general technical problems.
3. Improve Your Ability to Scale- You can adjust users and applications up or down to meet the changing demands of your business, try-out new applications without a large capital investment, and roll out new applications to smaller groups individually, reducing risk and spreading training costs.
4. Improved Security – Cloud providers have much more expertise in securing data than typical internal IT departments do, meaning that data is often safer from electronic and environmental threats in the cloud than it is in most company’s server rooms.
5. Provides Business Continuity – Along the same lines as the previous point, a Cloud vendors’ core function is providing infrastructure business continuity, so you can focus on your people and facilities in the face of a disaster.
6. Flexible Reporting – While some ERP providers limit the number of reports that you can access through a cloud subscription, most Cloud ERP solutions provide the same report visibility options that would be available on-premise.
7. Tight Integrations with Office and Outlook – Many Cloud ERP solutions, like Microsoft Dynamics GP Cloud, have the same integration options as their on-premise counterparts. Check with your Cloud vendor to ensure that your ERP solution will automate your common business processes.
8. Ideal for Start-Ups – Cloud ERP is a perfect fit for startup organizations and start up divisions within an existing company. You can use the functionality that you need and expand your use as the company grows.
9. Supports Global Expansion – One ERP system can service business operations around the globe, eliminating complex manual reporting from multiple ERP systems. You and your employees will access the application and your data from anywhere on any device.
10. Expand Employee Access - Because employees can access your ERP system from home (or anywhere else), your business can support green initiatives or promote employee satisfaction programs. In addition, critical business data will be store in the secure cloud and not be transported to and from the office on flash drives or laptops.
11. Upgrades Without Interruption - In the Cloud, software upgrades take place behind the scenes and without the need to involve internal IT resources. Upgrades should be coordinated with your vendor so that you and your team are ready to take advantage of the new functionality.
12. Gives You a Fresh Start - Moving to the Cloud presents you with the opportunity to assess and re-architect your business processes and systems so that they are as efficient as possible for your organization.
13. Continued Relationship with Trusted Business Partner - Just because you move to the Cloud does not necessarily mean that your relationship with your ERP partner is over. By selecting a solution like Microsoft Dynamics GP Cloud, you will still work closely with a VAR, like Socius, to implement the solution and provide ongoing training, support, education, and value.

These 13 points were adapted from the whitepaper, “35 Questions Every CFO Needs To Ask About ERP Software In the Cloud.”  If you have more questions or want to learn more about Cloud Computing and what it would mean for your business to use a Cloud ERP solution, download the whitepaper at no cost!

Microsoft Dynamics Kicks off Convergence 2012 with their Head in the Cloud

This morning, the annual Microsoft Dynamics Convergence conference got started in Houston, Texas with a keynote address by Kirill Tatarinov, president of Microsoft Business Solutions, and the COO of Microsoft, Kevin Turner, sharing about future of Microsoft Dynamics and the cloud.

Here are some of the highlights:

Kevin Taylor stated that “The cloud is (with other technologies) is the great enabler – Enabling people and business throughout the world to realize their full potential.”

Kevin also pointed out that the cloud will be a $241 Billion industry by 2020 and therefore Microsoft, which is spending $9 billion this year on research and development – $3 billion more than their next competitor – making them the number 1 or 2 company in world in terms of R&D investment, is “building the cloud where you decide.”

Kirill expounded on this statement saying, “We deliver Cloud on your terms so that you maintain control while taking full of advantage of elasticity.”

The Microsoft cloud platform is architected to support products across an entire company – which is a huge endeavor. However, they understand that an organization isn’t going to change from an entirely on-premise deployment to wholly hosted in the cloud over night. Kirill said that Microsoft Dynamics is providing “Tools & Solutions help you run your business, but you know best, what you need to stay ahead of the curve.”

It’s that power of choice that sets Microsoft Dynamics solutions apart from the competition. As industry analyst Ray Wang pointed out that over 40% of deals won by Microsoft Dynamics CRM over SalesForce.com were won because there is an on-premise deployment option with Dynamics CRM.

Microsoft is taking that power of choice to its other products. Microsoft announced that both Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2013 and Microsoft Dynamics GP 2013 will be cloud-enabled for Windows Azure and generally available in Q4 of calendar year 2012.

You don’t need to wait for these releases to get Microsoft Dynamics ERP deployed in the cloud, however. Learn more about Microsoft Dynamics Cloud ERP from Socius Cloud Services.

SharePoint at the Center of Microsoft’s Social Vision

Mark Fidelman, a contributing writer for Forbes, recently contributed a piece on Microsoft’s hesitance to state their vision for the social enterprise. In the article, he references two independent studies:

Harris found that 75% of organizations surveyed plan to implement a social solution to increase information sharing this year

Gartner deduced that 70% of those social implementations will fail.

Because of these findings, Microsoft took its time developing its social vision to ensure that its solutions would not only facilitate social sharing but also ensure the success of the implementation. According to Jared Spataro, Microsoft’s Senior Director of SharePoint Product Management, “It’s not just about technology, it’s about how you drive adoption, change management and getting the right people involved in the transformation.”

In light of that philosophy, Microsoft has now released their vision for the social enterprise as a four pronged approach that they are uniquely suited to deliver on. After all, Microsoft is the organization in the world that has:

• The ability connect people and information to a socially enabled productivity platform via SharePoint
• Can enable the deployment of this technology on the desktop, on large touch surfaces or mobile devices
• All of these solutions in a flexible cloud environment
• The analytical tools to better understand both the social tools and their benefits

Learn more about how your organization can get more social with Microsoft SharePoint.

How CFOs View Cloud Computing and Cloud ERP

CIO magazine published a great piece about “Why CFOs and Cloud Computing Have a Love-Hate Relationship” in which they detail the many benefits and drawbacks that CFOs perceive and experience with cloud computing solutions. The article states that CFOs love cloud computing solutions because of their inherent ability to shift spending from capital investments to a pay-as-you-go, regular pattern of spending. Whereas, it says that CFOs hate the uncertainty of the variable, usage-based pricing that is often associated with cloud solutions.

However, with many ERP solutions deployed in the cloud, like the solutions offered by Socius Cloud Services, once you initially identify your needs, you will be put on a predictable monthly payment plan. You can calculate your monthly costs for Microsoft Dynamics GP in the cloud here.

To gain a little clearer picture of how cloud ERP solutions look to the CFOs, check out the infographic below: