I'm collaborating with our finops team to find some reliable platforms that can actually help us save money on Azure. We're using multiple cloud services, but Azure is our biggest expense.
I want to avoid sales pitches and want to focus on tools that deliver solid results. Here's what I need from any recommendations:
1. A product and support that truly deliver.
2. Tools that reveal real savings opportunities, not just the obvious data.
3. Vendors that don't overpromise; I tried a platform last year that claimed 300% savings but ended up being a total letdown.
Just to give you an idea, our cloud expenses run about $650k a month, and we need to ensure compliance with EU regulations like GDPR and ISO 27001.
Let's see what has worked for you or if there's anything that fell short!
1 Answer
We've been managing pretty well with Azure's own tools like Azure Advisor and Cost Management. Adding Reserved Instances and setting up automated startup/shutdown schedules has helped a lot. We also found switching to standard SSDs instead of premium saved us money. Honestly, I haven't felt the need for third-party tools like CloudCheckr since the native tools have caught up.
Thanks for sharing your approach! I get that Azure's built-in tools are solid, but we've had issues where resources slip through the cracks. We're looking for ways to tighten our grip on cost management beyond the basics.