The Value of DevOps Managed Services

In today’s competitive enterprise landscape, it is more important than ever that businesses are able to iterate quickly in order to deliver new products, features, and services to customers at a faster pace. Additionally, many organizations are also facing decisions about whether to use a managed service that involves moving their data centers to the cloud, or sticking with their on-premise data centers.

This is where the importance of a DevOps approach comes in to play. Companies utilizing AWS managed services are able to leverage DevOps resources that automate infrastructure management tasks and accelerate the production and deployment of quality work. How? Let’s take a closer look. Understanding these critical benefits will likely bring into focus, by comparison, why many on-premise data centers tend to fall short.

What is DevOps?

DevOps is a methodology that merges development and operations teams to improve collaboration and productivity. By utilizing practices like continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD), automation, and real-time monitoring, DevOps aims to streamline software development and deployment. This approach fosters a culture of shared responsibility, leading to faster innovation, frequent deployments, and quicker recovery from failures.

What is the Role of DevOps Managed Services?

DevOps managed services play a crucial role in enabling businesses to implement and sustain DevOps practices effectively. These services provide expertise in automation, CI/CD pipelines, and infrastructure management, helping organizations optimize their IT operations. By leveraging DevOps managed services, businesses can enhance system reliability, accelerate development cycles, and focus on their core activities while the service provider handles the technical complexities.

Why is There a Rise in DevOps Managed Services?

The rise in DevOps managed services can be attributed to the increasing need for agility, efficiency, and scalability in IT operations. As businesses strive to innovate faster and improve customer experiences, the demand for seamless integration of development and operations grows. DevOps managed services offer the expertise and tools necessary to achieve these goals, enabling organizations to stay competitive in a rapidly evolving digital landscape. This trend is further driven by the adoption of cloud technologies, which require sophisticated management and automation capabilities that DevOps managed services provide.

What are the Benefits of DevOps Managed Services?

DevOps managed services offer a transformative approach to IT operations by blending development and operations. This integration drives efficiency, accelerates deployment cycles, and enhances system reliability and security. Leveraging the expertise and tools of DevOps managed service providers means businesses can focus on their core objectives while enjoying optimized performance and scalability. These services help companies stay agile and competitive as the market changes. Some key benefits of DevOps managed services include:

Faster Turnaround Times

When companies utilize managed services in an AWS environment, everything happens faster, from building and monitoring environments to deploying applications. Provisioning of servers is also easier, since AWS has deployed virtually unlimited compute resources that are available on-demand. Furthermore, companies working in a managed AWS environment have access to a variety of DevOps tools dedicated to developing customized automation solutions, fast. Trusted teams like Mission can help you determine which of these DevOps tools will work best for you. A couple of examples include:

• AWS OpsWorks for Chef Automate: This service provides a fully managed Chef Automate server and suite of automation tools that give you workflow automation for continuous deployment. It also dynamically configures newly provisioned instances by automatically registering new instances in Auto Scaling groups with your chef server.
• AWS CloudFormation: This service provides a common language to describe and provision all the infrastructure resources in your cloud environment.  Modeling your infrastructure in a cloud file helps standardize infrastructure components across your organization. Additionally, AWS CloudFormation provisions your resources in a safe, repeatable manner, allowing you to build and rebuild your infrastructure applications without performing any manual actions.

Dow Jones & Company, global provider of news and business information, migrated from an on-premises environment to AWS, and thanks to the host of resources available, was able to successfully accelerate output. “Our overall product development velocity has increased by at least 30%,” Dow Jones & Company’s Chief Information Officer and Global Head of Technology Stephen Orban said.

Improved System Reliability

One of the standout benefits of DevOps managed services is the significant improvement in system reliability. By integrating development and operations, these services ensure that your IT environment runs smoothly with minimal interruptions. Continuous monitoring and automated testing help identify and resolve issues before they impact users. This proactive approach leads to enhanced performance, reduced downtime, and a more robust IT infrastructure. Ultimately, improved system reliability translates to better user experiences and increased productivity for your business.

Increased Productivity

Since AWS is responsible for managing and operating the infrastructure that runs all of the services in the AWS Cloud, customers utilizing AWS managed services and DevOps tools have more time to focus on what they do best: their core business. “Using AWS gives us the freedom to be agile…why should I want to spend my time learning how to operate a database or a Hadoop center when I can have predictable costs on the AWS Cloud and avoid unnecessary operational responsibility?” Orban said. “My preference is to have my team build products rather than running data centers…Now that data center is a commodity, that’s exactly what they’re able to do.”

Conversely, traditional managed service providers have to perform updates, monitoring, and maintenance in-house. This entails a lot of tedious, manual work, such as making phone calls, ordering parts, and waiting for shipping, increasing headaches as well as the potential for human error.

Enhanced Security

Security is a top priority for any organization, and DevOps managed services excel in this area by providing proactive monitoring and comprehensive risk management. With constant vigilance, potential threats are detected and addressed promptly, ensuring that your systems remain secure. Integrating security practices into the DevOps pipeline (DevSecOps) means that security is built into every development and deployment stage. This continuous focus on security helps protect sensitive data, comply with regulations, and maintain trust with customers and stakeholders.

Cost Optimization

Managed services in an AWS environment lead to increased agility and productivity, but the benefits don’t stop there. They present significant cost optimization opportunities.

Traditional managed service providers have a tremendous amount of costs to consider, such as paying for space, hardware, software, power and cooling distribution, and a team of trained IT personnel. This can lead to wasted expense, particularly if you pay for more space and capacity than you actually use.

Conversely, AWS provides a way to acquire and use infrastructure on-demand, so you only pay for what you use. Furthermore, AWS utilizes the economy of scale to continually lower costs, offers a model choice to support variable and stable workloads, and delivers greater savings as workloads grow. As an example, InfoSpace, a leading provider of metasearch and monetization solutions for customers and partners worldwide, moved from colocation facilities in Washington and Virginia over to AWS, and reported reducing their 2013 capital budget by 72%.

Scalability

Scalability is essential for businesses looking to grow and adapt to changing demands. DevOps managed services offer the flexibility to easily scale your IT infrastructure up or down based on your needs. Whether you’re experiencing a sudden spike in user traffic or planning for long-term growth, these services ensure that your IT resources can be adjusted quickly and efficiently. This ability to scale seamlessly helps maintain optimal performance, reduces costs, and ensures that your business can respond agilely to market changes and opportunities.

Expert Support

Access to specialized knowledge and tools is a key advantage of DevOps managed services. These providers bring extensive expertise in automation, CI/CD pipelines, and cloud infrastructure management. By partnering with experienced DevOps professionals, businesses can leverage cutting-edge technologies and DevOps best practices without the need to build and maintain an in-house team. This expert support not only enhances the efficiency and effectiveness of your IT operations but also allows your internal teams to focus on strategic initiatives and core business goals.

How can Mission Cloud Help?

Utilizing all of the resources and DevOps tools in a managed AWS environment can benefit your organization in many ways. DevOps managed services can revolutionize your IT operations, delivering improved system reliability, enhanced security, expert support, and seamless scalability. Mission Cloud, a leading provider of AWS DevOps consulting services, specializes in automating deployment processes and optimizing your IT infrastructure. Working alongside a partner like Mission, you can architect a customized plan perfectly suited to meet your company’s key objectives. With their team of experienced cloud solutions architects and DevOps engineers, Mission Cloud ensures your business can innovate quickly and effectively. Learn more about Mission Cloud's DevOps services.