TECH & AI
Cost visibility during migration poses another challenge . Mallory warns businesses they could be paying twice for expensive data to be stored both on-prem and in the cloud . She calls this “ double bubble ”.
“ This has happened for years , this is not a new trend , but that idea of ‘ double bubble ’ when you are migrating ,” Mallory explains .
“ If you have a big database that you ’ re migrating to the cloud , while you have an open application on-prem and in cloud , you are paying for both .”
Automation drives efficiency A key development in Apptio ’ s approach is the increasing role of automation in cost optimisation . The company ’ s latest Cloudability Premium package , recently recognised as a leader in both the Forrester Wave and Gartner Magic Quadrant for cloud financial management , incorporates elements of architecture , automation and orchestration .
“ Our newest package will do some architecture automation for you ,” Mallory notes . “ If we ’ re talking about pennies of savings per change , my engineers are too expensive to do that . However , thousands of changes saving pennies add up over time .”
Greg emphasises the importance of systematic thinking : “ It ’ s how you systematically think about all the applications you ’ re running , how much you need to run it and what the best way to run it is .” He cites an example where a workload running 12 times monthly could achieve the same result at one-twelfth the cost by running once .
Sustainability integration Of course , while speed and operational efficiency are vital for organisations when onboarding automation tools among other technologies , the environmental cost of these tools – and the energy they consume – is a vital consideration .
Ann Marie Chow , VP Global Customer Operations & Sustainability at Apptio , emphasises that sustainability metrics must be embedded within existing operational processes . “ It ’ s often very easy to leave sustainability on the side when budgets get cut , but if you embed it in your existing processes , you kill two birds with one stone ,” she says .
Apptio ’ s approach focuses on measurable metrics such as power consumption through compute hours . “ We factor our environmental costs around power because it is something you can directly measure ,” Ann explains .
“ Carbon emissions themselves are only estimates – there ’ s not an exact science behind it . So we focus on power consumption as it ties directly into the actions taken by an organisation .”
The company ’ s GreenOps capabilities are already showing significant results . Global payments company Mastercard was recently recognised as a finalist in the TBM Council Awards for achievements in technology sustainability while maintaining cost control .
74 January 2025