Patrick Thomas, cloud technologist at Dell Technologies (NYSE: DELL), said government agencies should come up with a more strategic approach to fielding and funding multicloud environments.
“Beyond the total cost of ownership, they need to reevaluate how they pay for cloud products and services” by choosing between spending as a capital expenditure and spending as an operational expense, Thomas wrote.
“An OpEx approach makes sense for many agencies because the initial cost of cloud adoption can be high. They get the most benefit from OpEx when they have a subscription and pay only for the services they use,” he noted.
Thomas said he believes agencies should adopt a funding model that is a combination of OpEx and CapEx approaches when it comes to multicloud environments.
He noted that agencies should use OpEx for demands that are challenging to forecast and more likely to fluctuate depending on the needs of customers and CapEx for demands that are long-term and are more predictable.
“By reconsidering their approach to building and funding multi-cloud environments, agencies can mature the way they manage a technology that is becoming foundational for government operations,” Thomas added.
