FinOps Services for Microsoft Azure
Optimising Your Microsoft Azure Environment
Microsoft Azure gives organisations the flexibility to scale infrastructure and applications quickly. But without effective cost management, that flexibility can quickly become expensive.
Virtual machines, databases, storage and other Azure services can continue generating costs long after they’re needed, while over-provisioned resources and inefficient pricing models can quietly increase your monthly bill.
As a Microsoft Azure Business Partner, DeeperThanBlue helps organisations understand, optimise and manage their Azure spend through practical Azure FinOps and cloud cost optimisation services.
Where can Azure costs be reduced?
Azure overspend rarely comes from one major mistake. More often, it’s the result of resources and services that have been deployed quickly but haven’t been reviewed as usage and requirements change.
We look for opportunities such as:
Over-provisioned virtual machines
VMs are often sized for peak demand but spend much of their time operating below capacity. Rightsizing can reduce costs without compromising performance.
Unused and orphaned resources
Unattached managed disks, unused public IP addresses, old snapshots and other resources can continue to incur charges even when they’re no longer supporting an active workload.
Inefficient pricing models
Long-running, predictable workloads may benefit from Azure Reserved Instances or Savings Plans. We can help assess your usage and identify where commitment-based pricing makes commercial sense.
Azure Hybrid Benefit
Eligible Windows Server and SQL Server workloads may be able to reduce Azure costs through existing licensing entitlements. We can help identify where Azure Hybrid Benefit can be applied.
Inefficient storage
Data doesn’t always need to remain on the most expensive storage tier. Lifecycle policies can automatically move data between hot, cool and archive tiers as access requirements change.
Non-production environments
Development and test environments don’t necessarily need to run continuously. Scheduling automatic shutdowns and using appropriate subscription options can help reduce unnecessary out-of-hours consumption.
Our Azure FinOps services
Azure already provides tools such as Azure Cost Management + Billing, budgets, alerts and Azure Advisor. The challenge is often turning the information they provide into an ongoing process for managing cloud costs.
Our Azure FinOps services can help you:
- Establish clear visibility of Azure spend across subscriptions, services, projects and environments.
- Develop tagging and cost allocation frameworks so Azure costs can be attributed to the teams and workloads responsible for them.
- Review Azure Advisor recommendations and identify practical optimisation opportunities.
- Right-size virtual machines and other Azure resources.
- Identify and safely remove unused and orphaned resources.
- Assess Reserved Instances and Savings Plans against actual usage patterns.
- Identify opportunities to use Azure Hybrid Benefit.
- Optimise Azure storage through appropriate tiers and lifecycle policies.
- Introduce budgets, alerts and regular cost reviews.
- Establish an ongoing approach to Azure cloud cost management.
Azure cost optimisation that keeps working
Reducing your Azure bill once is relatively easy. Keeping costs under control as your environment changes is harder.
New applications are deployed. Workloads scale. Teams provision additional resources. Usage patterns change. Without an ongoing process, yesterday’s optimisation can become tomorrow’s waste.
That’s why we treat Azure cost optimisation as an ongoing discipline, not a one-off cost-cutting exercise.
We start by establishing a clear baseline of your current Azure spend, identify the highest-value opportunities and prioritise actions according to potential savings, effort and business impact.
Where required, we can then provide ongoing FinOps support to monitor consumption, review costs and identify new optimisation opportunities as your Azure environment evolves.
Make more of your Azure investment
Azure should give your organisation the flexibility and scalability it needs without allowing unnecessary cloud costs to eat into your technology budget.
DeeperThanBlue combines Azure expertise with practical FinOps experience to help you understand where your Azure spend is going, identify what’s realistically recoverable and put the right processes in place to keep costs under control.
Talk to us about your Azure costs and we’ll start with a straightforward review of where your spend is going and what could realistically be optimised.
+44 (0)114 399 2820
info@deeperthanblue.com
Get in touch
