Cloud Services

AWS & Azure Cloud Services for Hosting, Integration, Data Warehousing, Analytics, and AI

We design and operate cloud systems on AWS and Azure for mission‑driven organizations. From hosting web applications and integrating cloud services to building data warehouses and AI pipelines, we bring a cloud‑agnostic approach that focuses on cost, technical fit, and strategic alignment—so you get the right platform for your mission, not the most expensive one.

AWS & Azure: What They Offer and When to Use Them

Both Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft Azure are mature cloud platforms that provide a wide range of services for compute, storage, databases, networking, analytics, machine learning, identity, and security. While both can support nearly any workload, there are practical differences that matter when selecting a platform for hosting applications, building data warehouses, or integrating AI capabilities.

AWS Cloud Services (When AWS is a strong fit)

Extensive global regions and availability zones for low-latency hosting.
Broadest marketplace of third‑party integrations and partner ecosystem.
Data services like Amazon Redshift (data warehouse), AWS Glue (ETL), and SageMaker (ML) for analytics and AI.
Strong serverless ecosystem (Lambda, API Gateway) for cost‑efficient event-driven apps.
Good fit when you need maximum flexibility, deep ecosystem integrations, or existing AWS investments.

Microsoft Azure (When Azure is a strong fit)

Native integration with Microsoft 365, Active Directory, and enterprise identity (Azure AD).
Azure Synapse Analytics and Azure Data Factory for data warehousing and ETL/ELT.
Strong PaaS and managed SQL offerings (Azure SQL, Cosmos DB) for quick application lift‑and‑shift.
Azure ML and cognitive services for enterprise AI scenarios.
Good fit when your organization is deeply tied to Microsoft tooling, needs hybrid on‑prem connectivity, or values enterprise support.

Both vendors support managed Kubernetes, serverless compute, and modern data platforms. Choosing the right cloud often depends on vendor relationships, compliance needs, team skills, and cost expectations. Our cloud‑agnostic approach assesses these factors together so you get the best fit for your situation.

Our Cloud‑Agnostic Approach: How We Select the Right Cloud for You

We don’t push a single cloud. Instead, we evaluate AWS, Azure, and other providers against your financial constraints, preferred tech stack, compliance requirements, and long‑term technology strategy. Our goal is to recommend a cloud architecture that balances total cost of ownership (TCO), performance, security, and operational simplicity.

How we make the decision (simple, practical steps)

Understand your goals: Business outcomes, SLAs, user geography, and growth expectations.
Inventory current assets: Existing cloud spend, vendor contracts, skillsets, and integrations.
Cost modeling: Compare estimated costs across AWS and Azure for compute, storage, data egress, and managed services—using real consumption patterns where possible.
Technical fit: Match services (managed databases, serverless, ML) to your stack preferences—TypeScript/Node, .NET, Python, etc.
Security & compliance: Ensure chosen controls meet HIPAA, FERPA, CJIS, or other required frameworks.
Operational readiness: Evaluate your team’s experience and plan training, runbooks, and managed services where helpful.
Proof of value: Run a short pilot or PoC to validate assumptions and compare real performance and cost.

We combine architecture best practices with cloud cost optimization (FinOps) to ensure the recommended platform meets both technical and financial goals. Sometimes the best answer is multi‑cloud or hybrid—running certain workloads on Azure while keeping analytics in BigQuery or Redshift on AWS, for example.

Cloud Services We Provide: Hosting, Integration, Data Warehousing, Analytics & AI

Our cloud services span the full lifecycle from strategy to long‑term operations:

Cloud Migration & Modernization Strategy

We favor incremental, low‑risk migration approaches that deliver value early while reducing technical debt. Common migration patterns include:

Rehost: Lift‑and‑shift VMs or apps to managed compute for rapid migration.
Replatform: Move to managed database or PaaS components for easier operations.
Refactor: Re-architect applications to use serverless or microservices for scale and cost efficiency.
Data migration: Secure, repeatable pipelines to move databases to cloud data warehouses with validation and reconciliation.

We run migration readiness assessments, map dependencies, create cutover plans, and validate every step with parallel runs and rollback procedures to protect uptime and data integrity.

Security, Compliance & Reliability in the Cloud

Security is integral to cloud architecture. Our practices include zero‑trust network design, IAM design (Azure AD, IAM roles), encryption in transit and at rest, key management, vulnerability scanning, and incident response playbooks. We help organizations meet HIPAA, FERPA, SOC 2, and other compliance requirements on AWS and Azure.

Resilience & Reliability

We set service level objectives (SLOs), implement multi‑AZ deployments, automated backups, disaster recovery plans, and run chaos engineering drills where necessary to improve system resiliency.

Cost Optimization & Financial Stewardship (FinOps)

Cloud vendor selection is a financial decision as much as a technical one. We perform rigorous cost modeling and ongoing FinOps practices to keep cloud spending aligned with mission priorities:

Right‑sizing compute and storage, reserved instances vs. on‑demand analysis.
Data egress and storage tiering strategies to lower recurring costs.
Automated scaling and scheduling to avoid paying for idle resources.
Tagging, allocation, and reporting so departments can see and manage their spend.

Examples & Use Cases

Case: Data Warehouse on Azure Synapse

We helped a nonprofit consolidate fundraising, program, and finance data into Azure Synapse, reducing monthly reporting time from 10 days to 2 hours and improving donor stewardship through timely analytics.

Case: Scalable Hosting on AWS

For a national service provider we migrated a legacy web app to AWS using containers and managed databases, cutting infrastructure cost by 35% and improving uptime during peak events.

FAQS

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Which cloud is cheaper: AWS or Azure?

It depends on workload and usage patterns. We model expected consumption to compare costs including compute, storage, egress, and managed services. Discounts, committed use, and reserved instances can also change the outcome.

2. What does cloud‑agnostic mean?

Cloud‑agnostic means we evaluate and use the best cloud for each workload rather than being locked into one vendor. It also means designing systems that avoid excessive vendor lock‑in where appropriate.

3. Can you help with hybrid cloud or on‑prem systems?

Yes. We design hybrid architectures that securely connect on‑prem infrastructure with cloud services using VPNs, ExpressRoute, or Direct Connect and consistent identity and security controls.

4. Do you manage cloud operations?

We offer managed cloud services including monitoring, patching, backups, security ops, and FinOps to keep your environment healthy and costs predictable.

Talk to Our Cloud Team

Whether you need AWS or Azure expertise—or a cloud-agnostic strategy that mixes providers—we can help. Schedule a cloud assessment and get a prioritized roadmap with cost estimates and a pilot plan.

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