Cloud or On-Premise… What’s Right For You?

An important step when selecting a Corporate Performance Management (CPM) solution is deciding whether to use a cloud-based or an on-premise solution. They both have their benefits and perceived drawbacks but, with the increasing availability, flexibility, and scalability of cloud services, on-premise solutions are becoming a less preferred option. However, that doesn’t mean you should opt for a cloud solution every time. There are several factors to consider and, given the requirements, an on-premise solution can be the better fit.

Cloud vs On-Premise

Implementation

A SaaS platform offers many benefits when it comes to implementation. The low initial investment required for infrastructure set-up helps save on costs and time involved with setting up servers and system framework to support the solution. This results in faster and easier implementation compared to an on-premise one. Moreover, cloud solutions are highly scalable, providing you easy access to more processing power when required.

IT Cost and Control

With cloud-based solutions, the service provider is responsible for maintaining the IT infrastructure and release solution updates. This is ideal for companies that do not want to get heavily involved in IT related activities. If you need to have full control of the infrastructure to either manage the software version or tweak servers to boost performance, then an on-premise solution is preferable. However, depending on the vendor, there may be private cloud solutions where the software is managed and hosted internally and offers the highest security and flexibility of any cloud solution, rivalling the benefits of an on-premise solution.

Performance

You will need a consistent internet connection and reliable service in order to use cloud platforms but that shouldn’t be a problem in most cases. You can negotiate your SLA with your vendor to increase service up time but, to be safe, we advise you to pick a vendor who has been operating for a few years with reputable clientele. In the end, you trade potential connectivity performance issues for 24/7 accessibility whereas on-premise solutions are much more limited in terms of accessibility.

Security and Recovery

Traditionally, on-premise solutions were perceived to be more secure than cloud solutions but with the increasing popularity of cloud-based solutions, vendors are increasingly focused on securing their working environments. On-premise solutions still have the edge given that data is stored internally but users can encrypt data before sending it to the cloud as an extra security measure. In the case of disaster recovery, cloud solutions back up data regularly in multiple data centers, allowing users to recover data faster than on-premise physical backup methods.

To conclude, multiple factors must be taken into consideration while selecting a cloud-based or an on-premise CPM solution. A product requirement check-list can be drafted ahead of the platform evaluation stage to ascertain key factors that could influence decision-making based on your company’s unique needs. In most cases, a cloud solution is the ideal option because of quicker implementation time, lower cost, better performance, and faster recovery. On the other-hand, on-premise solutions are ideal for hardware control and security with cloud solutions not far behind in those aspects.