Case Study

Streamlining Azure Management with qTOOLS

In the complex world of cloud infrastructure, effectively managing a multitude of Azure subscriptions presents a daunting challenge for many enterprises. This blog delves into how Qualigy Tech’s Cloud Enablement platform, qTOOLS, dramatically transformed one enterprise’s cloud operations, leading to enhanced security, streamlined workflows, and considerable cost reductions. By addressing the intricate needs of managing over 30 Azure subscriptions, we unlocked new efficiencies and established a more robust, cost-effective cloud environment.

Problem Statement

A leading market research company, with over 30 Azure Subscriptions, faced significant challenges in managing their cloud infrastructure. Their issues were threefold: lack of centralized subscription request and provisioning process, inadequate security assessment and reporting, and inefficient cloud spend categorization. This led to escalated costs, security vulnerabilities, and operational inefficiencies.

Solution

1. Streamlined Subscription Management: qGOV provides an automated process for requesting and provisioning new Azure subscriptions, creating an opiniated Landing Zone for Azure. This reduced the manual effort and time taken to onboard new subscriptions, ensuring a consistent setup aligned with Microsoft’s best practices.
2. Enhanced Security Assessment: qSEC included robust tools for continuous assessment and reporting on the security posture of their Azure resources. By identifying and mitigating potential vulnerabilities, we enhanced their overall security framework.
3. Effective Spend Categorization and Tagging: We developed a strategic tagging policy to identify various workloads and their associated costs. This tagging strategy was crucial in categorizing cloud spend and was instrumental in subsequent optimization efforts.
4. Custom Dashboards and Reporting: To provide clear visibility into their Azure environment, we created custom dashboards using qFI. These dashboards offered insights into spending patterns, resource utilization, and security status, enabling informed decision-making.

Details

• Automated Provisioning: After detailed discussions, we proposed and created a Management Groups hierarchy. We defined Organization Policies and assigned them to Management Groups providing Guardrails for the enterprise workloads. We customized the Subscription Vending Machine module of qGOV for the client’s specific needs. Using these, we streamlined the provisioning process, ensuring each new subscription was configured with the necessary policies and settings right from the start.

• Security Tools: qSEC is a Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) tool with hundreds of security checks. It complements Azure Policy controls to identify and measure security risk. qSEC dashboards report compliance against industry standards like CISv3, NIST Cloud Standards, FedRAMP, etc. We reviewed default checks provided by qSEC and added additional checks to meet the client’s needs.

• Tagging Strategy: Tags were carefully designed to reflect cost centers, environments, and project codes, allowing for detailed tracking and reporting of resource usage and spending. Tag hierarchy was defined and implemented to enable proper inheritance for Cost Analysis.

• Cost Dashboards: qFI integrates enterprise data with Azure Cost reports to facilitate enriched Chargeback and Showback reports. Using Power BI, a client-chosen BI solution, we built comprehensive dashboards that provided real-time insights into the overall cost, cost per Business Unit, and Platform/Application. Our reports also included spending forecasts, trends, cost anomalies, etc.

Results

• 20% Reduction in Cloud Spend: The tagging strategy and custom dashboards empowered the enterprise to identify inefficiencies and optimize resource usage, resulting in a 20% reduction in overall cloud spend.

• Enhanced Security Posture: With continuous monitoring and automated compliance checks, the enterprise strengthened its defense against potential threats and vulnerabilities.

• Operational Efficiency: The automated processes for subscription management significantly reduced manual efforts and errors, leading to smoother operations and faster deployment of new projects.

• Informed Decision-Making: The custom dashboards provided the enterprise with the necessary tools to make data-driven decisions, further optimizing their cloud environment.