Biotechnology Company saved 15% on monthly cloud spend
Making cloud cost management a reality for a global biotechnology company.
A global biotechnology company was leveraging the benefits of AWS to enable innovative and bespoke customer solutions. AWS allowed the company to utilise flexible sequencing and computing capacity, whilst delivering ongoing improvements in analytics tools and applications.
The Problem
As the company continued to experience strong growth powered by its digital services, its cloud spend also grew. The business needed to get to grips with its AWS spend, and sought a tool to consolidate and manage its cloud usage.
Because of legacy issues in terms of spend, usage and processes, the company needed a tool that would not only provide clear high-level views across the cloud, but also more granular insights of specific usage and activities, with feedback, warnings and recommendations.
The Challenge
At leadership level, increasing AWS costs were constantly high on the agenda. When forecasting, the business didn’t want to sustain the costs they were paying for AWS.
This wasn’t just a siloed technology project. It wasn’t a one-off IT fix. This was an enterprise-wide application and approach, embracing FinOps for the first time. A taskforce of key decision makers was therefore set up to oversee the management of cloud optimisation.
“When we talk about FinOps and managing cloud usage, most people talk purely about reducing costs. And that’s very important. However, we believe the focus is more centred on best practices. If we conduct our cloud usage in a smart way, through best practices, then cost savings will follow. And Nordcloud Klarity is the best tool to enable this approach.”
Director of Software Engineering, Global Biotechnology Company
Also, the key stakeholders were quick to understand this wasn’t just a case of implementing a cloud management tool. FinOps is also a culture, an ongoing way of working, learning and implementing best practices. Therefore, they needed a partnership approach from their provider. Onboarding, training and ongoing support were important factors in their selection process.
Enter Nordcloud Klarity.
Nordcloud Klarity’s Solution
Nordcloud Klarity automates cloud cost management, making FinOps (and continuous cloud cost savings) a reality.
The first lightbulb moment came when the taskforce first saw the Nordcloud Klarity dashboard in action – they could see this was the solution to their needs. During the demo, the dashboard clearly showed in real time where costs were, where they could be saved and what forecasted spend would be – all in one place.
Nordcloud Klarity’s usability was key. Anyone could go into the tool, click an item and access all the information they needed. Also, the automatic categorisation of resources for business units and activities was important, saving time compared with manual tagging and delivering speedy insights. The team could then demonstrate usage by department, and distribute costs accordingly.
But, crucially, it’s more than a tool. To maximise the value of Nordcloud Klarity, the onboarding process was customised for the company’s team and structure. This meant a very fast and smooth integration. The automated tagging, and any fixes were extremely quick, and the partnered approach from the beginning saw the support team provide regular advice and suggestions, about how to use Klarity in different ways.
Visibility
The dashboard provided the single source of truth across all AWS applications and usage.
Insight
Deeper insight by application and department is quick and easy to find – meaning costs can be distributed accordingly.
FinOps-Ready
Ongoing support will enables the team to fully leverage tools and adopt optimal FinOps best practices.
Speed
Onboarding was rapid and customised, so the team could start implementing best practices and reducing costs, fast.
Results Delivered
The primary business goal to reduce AWS costs was a success, as Nordcloud Klarity helped achieve a reduction of 15% in monthly cloud spend.
The onboarding process was fast and smooth, with all 21 applications onboarded within two weeks. And, when the team now create new applications or structures, Nordcloud Klarity can be used as a tool to prove the potential value.
But Nordcloud Klarity, isn’t just a cloud management tool. The company also benefits from the support and technology expertise to embed those FinOps best practices across the business. Through the training and onboarding, to support and continued knowledge-sharing, the company was able to smoothly transition to this optimised way of working and leveraging AWS.
15%
reduction in monthly cloud spend
21
cloud applications onboarded
2
weeks to onboard all applications
