This week, Oracle announced Essbase as a service on the Cloud. Essbase, the most powerful analytical database, can now be created, built, used, without you having to invest in a server (or two). Tack this onto Planning on the Cloud (PBCS) , and “HFM” on the Cloud (FCCS) which can also be used without the purchase of multiple of servers. Financial Analysts can now build and maintain their environments without those high dollar pesky consultants or burden their infrastructure folks with installation and server reboots.
Or can they?
That last statement is half true. You can truly remove the burden from you infrastructure folks. But, can you really get rid of the consultants? Just some things to help you plan for your Cloud implementation and support…..all of course coming from my humble opinion and experience.
What is your end game? What do you expect from the application in 5 years? Are you looking for a quick install to get a budget on the books? Is your consolidation too slow and you need something faster? Have you or do you plan on acquiring companies? If there is any complexity to your big picture, bring someone into help visualize it with you. The last thing you want to do is create something, only to recreate it again the following year. Build for success.
Can you build your environment? Sure. If you have resources to 100% dedicate to the project, who 100% know the environment, the legacy systems, the process flow and data. I definitely think it’s doable. Would I advise it? No. Here’s why. You’re busy. You have jobs. You have 9 million other things to do, on top of learning how to build an application, and then actually building it.
Can you maintain your environment? Again, yes. You can load the data files, maintain the metadata, task lists, business rules. But, do you have the right resources for this? And if you DO have the right resources, do they have the time to dedicate to this? There are a lot of tasks that go into maintaining an application.
I am loving these products. They are robust and powerful, and user friendly. They are truly the right fit for those companies that either can’t or don’t want to invest in infrastructure. Can you do it all internally? Quite possibly, yes. But, is it the right thing to do? Just think it.
~Sum
EPMSxSW 