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What’s the point of Cloud – why would I want that? The decision to go to a Cloud hosted ERP system is based around several decision points.

Do you have good equipment?

Do you have enough good equipment at your company now? If the answer is yes, then you may well want to exhaust that equipment for its useful life. If you have good equipment and you go to the Cloud you will be writing that complete piece of equipment off right now. If you don’t have good equipment then you will need to decide whether to take the Pros & Cons of Cloud and decide what to do.

Your bandwidth

If you are in an area where you have good internet connection then you would consider Cloud. It your bandwidth is poor then you don’t have the choice – on premise is for you.

Security of data

Backups done for you, your data centre is as safe as a Boeing 747. Servers will eventually go down somewhere and you may be off your system for a period of time with a complete disaster. However when you think about the risk of losing your data in a Cloud Solution it would be far safer than hosting at your premises where theft, fire, flood and the equipment failure would be higher.

Server for Server

You don’t need to purchase equipment however you will pay for whatever equipment that you use. In the Cloud you will be paying for the hosting, service level and flexibility. In the long run the cost of a server in your office & the cost of a hosted solution (maintained to the same standard) will be the same.

Always Up

This is an interesting point. A hosted solution will have more up time because it will be on a better technical connection to the Internet, on a fatter pipe, – so for a multi warehouse solution you will always have each warehouse having the opportunity for great web access & not be held back by a slow ADSL 2 speed at head off ice. You will also get good access when you are travelling away from your office.

The Microsoft SQL Server available through MS Azure is provided as a service to users and is cheaper than the full MS SQL database license & CALS. This is a more efficient way to buy the MS SQL Server.

Updates

You won’t have to worry about keeping your server updated with newer versions of software. The Azure service will manage that for you. So that is an advantage.

Ramp up / down

Ramp up of down on the usage of the amount of CPU power that you need. The MS Azure platform automatically increases and decreases the amount of server power you need by the hour. You couldn’t do this with your own servers. Whether this is an advantage – well it depends on whether you have seasonal demand for computer power, or alternatively want to have a price for running your business where you can contain costs.
See further blog on the Cons of Cloud.

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