The movement to the Cloud is unstoppable. From Barron’s to Bloomberg, business publications everywhere are acknowledging its power, potential, and undeniable cost effectiveness.
Moving some or all of their performance management – the intersection of business intelligence (BI), manufacturing or operational intelligence (MI/OI), data warehousing, financial analysis, continuous improvement – to the Cloud is especially appealing for small- to medium- sized businesses (SMBs). These companies traditionally have been locked out of major technology/software purchases because they have required 5- to 6-figure capital commitments up-front, and 7-figure investments over the long run.
The Cloud is a game-changer, allowing SMB’s with revenues of $5 million to $2 Billion access to next-generation software applications and robust, predictive analytics at a fraction of the cost — usually about 20% — of traditional technology solutions.
SMB’s are poised to reap the benefits of migration to the cloud. More agile and less risk-averse than many larger and more established companies, SMB’s are highly motivated to try new things, especially those who are paying attention and looking ahead. Many times these are forward-thinking businesses with built-in entrepreneurial spirit and a history and continuing practice of innovation.
That said, even large businesses with more than $2 billion in revenue can be highly motivated to identify additional business value. These established leaders now have the option to test newer solutions in small, low-risk areas of their operations. By doing so, they can reveal millions of dollars of opportunity that can be realized by a wider rollout of a cloud-based solution.
In short, migrating from old traditional, on-premise expensive systems to the Cloud can free up extra working capital for any company to generate greater return on existing investments.
Companies interesting in exploring the business value the Cloud can offer should look for the following qualities in any cloud application they are considering:
- Remote collaboration platform
- Menu of wraparound services
- Data connector with buffering
- “App” marketplace
- Robust functionality
- Industry expertise
- Low Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)
- Secure data environment
- Scalability and flexibility
- Real-time visibility
- Ease of configuration
- Speed of implementation
- Intuitive graphic user interface
Companies like IQity can serve as helpful advisors as you evaluate whether transitioning your business to the public or the private cloud makes sense for your company given your unique needs. We can also help you implement a cloud-based Enterprise Performance Management solution such as IQ-Fusion, and/or train your team on how leverage SaaS solutions. To learn more about how cloud-based applications can help with your performance management needs, contact us to kickstart a conversation.
