Azure vs. Cloud vs. Hosting – Options for Moving Dynamics Online

With all of the buzz about the cloud, you may be wondering what the options mean and what they mean for you and your Microsoft Dynamics business solutions.  In a word, the cloud means “opportunity.”

There are three opportunities for you to continue to use your Microsoft Dynamics solution while taking advantage of the new benefits available in the cloud.

If you are:

• Looking for ways to reduce the burden of maintaining your Microsoft Dynamics solution for your IT personnel
• Discovering that your servers are not able to keep up with your Microsoft Dynamics data needs but you don’t want to spend a lot to upgrade your hardware
• A growing business (or you have seasonal business needs) and your on-premises solution isn’t allowing you to scale as quickly as you need to

Then Azure (PaaS) or Hosting (IaaS) would be great options for you:

Azure – Azure is an example of the highly flexible Platform as a Service (PaaS).  That means that you can move your existing licenses to the Windows Azure online platform.  However, if you decide to turn off the service in the future, you will need to replace your licenses with new on-premises licenses in order to continue using your solution.  With the flexibility of Azure also comes a fluctuating pricing model.

Hosting – Socius Cloud Services can host your Dynamics licenses in our secure and reliable environment through our Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) offering.  Instead of maintaining and upgrading your hardware, you can pay a monthly fee and know that your solution is being maintained and updated by experts without stressing your IT departments or your infrastructure.

If you have:

• Lapsed Microsoft Dynamics maintenance fees that make upgrading your solution cost-prohibitive
• A need to add a significant number of licenses but lack the capacity to absorb the up-front cost of the licenses and/or the additional hardware necessary to support them on-premises

Then Azure (PaaS) or Cloud (SaaS) would be good options:

Azure – As mentioned above, Azure offers a great deal of flexibility, including the ability to pay monthly for your Microsoft Dynamics licenses and platform.  However, the fluctuating pricing model and licensing transfer issues can be a problematic for some organizations.

Cloud – With our Software as a Service offering, you can pay a predictable monthly fee for Dynamics licenses to be deployed in our private cloud, giving you upgrades so that you can take advantage of the latest functionality while avoiding annual maintenance fees.

Contact your Socius Account Manager to discuss any of these options further or for pricing.