Journey to the Centre of the Cloud with AWS

Next Gen Insights | Zach Marky |
18 January 2023

WHY MIGRATING TO AMAZON WEB SERVICES CLOUD IS RIGHT FOR YOUR ORGANISATION

Making the jump to cloud can be daunting and rife with uncertainties. Those who have turned that leap into a confident stride are reaping the rewards. The migration of business capabilities to cloud is an instinctive move for some, but not all. Hesitant? Then let us explore why in 2023, migrating to Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud is right for your organisation.

SECURING THE FUTURE

When on-premises servers and architectural real estate operate satisfactorily, there may be little internal impetus to kindle change. But time waits for no business, and the pace of technology is even less forgiving. Aging hardware and unsupported legacy systems are tantalising targets for hackers, hacktivists, and cybercriminals.

Amazon Web Services provide a wealth of tools for identity management, protection of data at scale, and threat detection. Companies across the world use Amazon GuardDuty to detect anomalies and launch automated defences. Utilising the latest technologies, from machine learning to threat intelligence, GuardDuty operates continually to defend against cyberattacks.

At the end of this article, we have compiled a list of the AWS security services we recommend.

IT’S ALL CONNECTED

Our working lives are increasingly mobile and dispersed, yet effective collaboration has never been so important. In recent years, organisations, whether established incumbents or start-ups, have embraced the flexibility of working from anywhere. From a cat café in Kyoto, to a staircase nook, to a Hawaiian hotel, work can be accomplished anywhere Wi-Fi exists.

From video meetings to collective coding environments, it matters little how advanced a technology is if people cannot connect to others. At Endava, we work closely with our customers to build connectivity and interoperability frameworks which deliver first-in-class communications. Cloud applications enabled by Amazon Web Services are natively ready for web, mobile and Internet of Things, delivering the connectivity required.

THOROUGHLY MODERN MINUTIA

Today’s companies, even those providing what on the surface appear to be traditional goods and services are increasingly reliant on data. Whether customer information or technical specifications, modern data management is essential to not only the meaningful use of that data, but to ably scale at times of demand. Legacy on-premises servers struggle with data modernisation and expansion. Increasing system capacity entails expensive hardware and costly expertise to maintain it, even when fitted in a timely manner, while historic layers of legacy systems pile complexities which stymie the response to business needs.

The serverless approach exemplified by Amazon Web Services shifts the perspective from an inward-looking debate over hardware and maintenance to a focus on the proactive delivery of solutions. Run code without a concern about provisioning or maintaining servers or clusters, simply set up and run what is needed, when it is needed. “Looking back, I’m not sure how we got anything to market in the past,” Endava Principal Consultant James Ayling reflects, “we needed to justify huge initial expenditure and sizable ongoing costs to put together on-site infrastructure and support for environments, fight to coordinate diverse resources across numerous departments, gain approval from architecture, strategy, security, and infrastructure. By which time the opportunity to strike may well have elapsed.”

FEET ON THE GROUND, HEAD IN THE CLOUDS

A cloud solution typically saves 25% on server costs, but that initial financial saving is only the start. Performance gains are equally important, especially in customer-facing applications. Here, elasticity is key. Amazon Web Services balances application, gateway, and network workloads on the fly, distributing network traffic across multiple targets. At peak times, load balancing ensures that every transaction is as responsive as in quieter times. Expansive metrics provide a vital insight into traffic flows and usage, while auto-scaling makes additional resources available when required to ensure end-customer demand is met.

LOOK AFTER THE PENNIES

In the AWS service model, users can save costs by paying only for the compute time used, unlike on-premises servers where unused resources must still be paid for.

However, potential savings go beyond simply migrating to cloud. Although less tangible, businesses can use their cloud solution as protection against a range of physical threats, such as flood or fire, eliminating insurance costs. Cloud backups in the form of secure encrypted data depositories negate the need for expensive on-site backup servers. Decommissioning on-premises servers and architectural real estate contributes to energy savings and assists with sustainability commitments. Indeed, many businesses see their progress to cloud as part of an overarching reform of their working practices, adopting a distributed working model, with some dispensing with the need for office space entirely.

At the end of this article, we have assembled a list of recommended AWS cost optimization services.

GET THE EDGE

From global financial challenges to technological advances, here at Endava, we help our customers respond to the fits and starts of today’s turbulent marketplaces. To do so, we recommend Amazon Web Services, not just because AWS is one of the world’s most successful cloud computing platforms, but because of what we have witnessed AWS deliver for our clients. Armen Kojekians, Senior Infrastructure Architect at Endava, explains: “The moment you ‘land’ your workloads into AWS, your options and opportunities are increased. You are exposed to a vast array of implementation patterns to bring your systems and applications into a modernised and cost-effective ecosystem. Figuratively speaking, there comes a point where you can have an idea in the morning, a prototype in the afternoon, and go to market in the evening. This gives businesses the competitive edge and helps them stand out.”

When considering a cloud migration, our architects look at the following AWS Security and Cost Optimization services:

Amazon GuardDuty, to monitors threats against your Amazon S3 resources.
AWS Artifact, for on-demand access to AWS’ security and compliance reports and select
online agreements.
AWS IAM Identity Center, to securely manage identities and access to AWS services and resources
AWS Organizations, for managing mutilpe accounts centrally.
AWS CloudFormation StackSets, to centrally manage AWS CloudFormation stacks across accounts and OUs in your organization.
Security Hub, to automate security checks and centralize security alerts.
AWS Control Tower, orchestrates the capabilities of other AWS services to build secure landing zones
AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Cost and Usage Report, AWS Budgets to plan for future cloud usage.
AWS Control Tower, AWS Organizations, Cost allocations tags, Tag policies, AWS
Resource Groups, AWS Cost Categories, AWS Cost Explorer, AWS Cost and Usage Report for measuring, monitoring and creating accountability.
RIs and SPs, Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling Groups, Spot Instances, for cost saving levers.
AWS Billing and Cost Management Console, AWS Identity and Access Management,
Service Control Policies (SCP), AWS Service Catalog, AWS Cost Anomaly Detection, AWS Budgets, to manage cloud expenditures.

In the next parts of our Journey to the Centre of the Cloud with AWS series, we will dive deeper into the details of migrating to AWS cloud and explore the multitude of new opportunities AWS offers once you are on board. Get ready to jump!

Zach Marky

PRINCIPAL CONSULTANT

Zach has over 25 years’ experience in insurance and insuretech, working in and with some of the UK’s most prominent insurance companies and technology providers. As a Principal Consultant, his mission is to enable clients to deliver the best possible service to their customers, using the very best digital solutions. Outside of work, Zach is a musician, artist, and published author.

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