Cloud Cost Optimization with Flexera One

This large organization managing over 220 cloud accounts, has been experiencing an alarming rise in cloud expenditures across multiple accounts. Without adequate oversight and control measures, cloud spend had been escalating unpredictably, leading to budgetary strains and limited cost visibility. The existing setup lacked automated monitoring, making it difficult for the team to step in before overspend events occurred.

The organization needed a way to automatically detect, report, and manage unexpected increases in service spend. Key goals included:

• Gaining visibility into cloud cost fluctuations across accounts.
• Automatically identifying and reporting excessive spending.
• Proactively engaging stakeholders for cost management and accountability.

To address these challenges, the team implemented Flexera One with two key modules:

• Cloud Cost Optimization: Provided granular insights into cloud spend, helping to identify trends, anomalies, and opportunities for cost-saving.
• Automation Module: Enabled automated governance and control by setting up a policy to detect unusual spend increases.

This policy was designed to automatically:

• Detect increased service spend based on predefined percentage thresholds.
• Raise an incident containing account details, spending data, and insights.
• Notify relevant cloud account owners to encourage timely action and prevent runaway costs.

The project resulted in significant improvements in cloud cost management:

• Timely Intervention: The automated alerts allowed the organization to address cost increases before they became significant budgetary issues. Cloud account owners were engaged immediately upon incidents, ensuring accountability and timely resolution.
• Enhanced Forecasting and Control: The visibility provided by Flexera One has facilitated more accurate forecasting and budgeting. With clear insights into spend patterns, the organization can now allocate resources more effectively and mitigate potential overspend.
• Scalable Governance: The automated policies created a foundation for continuous cost oversight, enabling the organization to scale cloud usage responsibly while