With the proliferation of cloud-based solutions, the concept of “anything as a Service” (XaaS), has become extremely common.  This article will provide a good perspective of “as a Service” options, and how they work together to provide a holistic approach to moving your XA system to the cloud.

Any cloud solution can be comprised of many XaaS offerings.  There are many variations in this space and many translations. Below we’ll discuss key “as-a-Service” offerings that would be part of an Infor XA and IBM move to the cloud:

• Platform as a Service (PaaS) - For XA and IBM footprints, PaaS refers to the IBM server, the “platform” that runs Infor XA. IBM PaaS provides an IBM Partition, or more than 1, dedicated to you and your environment. Your partition is hosted on a larger IBM server, in the cloud, shared with other IBM-hosted companies.
• Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - Surrounding your IBM server are various network technologies – Firewalls, VPNs, Ethernet technology, auxiliary Windows servers, etc… All of which are needed for fully enabled access to your IBM and XA server.
• Backup as a Service (BaaS) - Standard backup and retention policies remain critical to your system. BaaS enablement provides a cloud-based backup of your system, based on your retention policies.
• Software as a Service (SaaS) - With the move to the cloud, you can also move to a true subscription model for your core applications. Infor offers a hosted SaaS model, including all “as a Service” models above, embedding Infor support, and annual license fees into one model.
• Disaster Recovery of a Service (DRaaS) - This is an optional extension to the services mentioned above. By their very nature, hosted solutions offer great resiliency and redundancy as mentioned above. However, additional levels of a redundant system, geographical isolation, and expedited recovery models. They are available to provide assurance of absolute minimal loss of transactional data, and the quickest possible recovery time.  A review of Recovery Point Objectives (RPO), and Recovery Time Objectives (RTO) is suggested.
• Managed Services - All the XaaS offerings are surrounded by Managed Services, from your cloud provider, to ensure cloud-centric continuous operations and off-loading day-to-day maintenance.

What next? 

If you are considering your options, ISE can provide a great amount of guidance – should you move, what are the benefits, what are the costs, and how do you get there?  To request an opening discovery call, at no charge, please contact your ISE sales rep or Tom.Bell@ise-erp.com