Cloud Insights

Fund allocates $1.5 million to Sage Business Partner customers who migrate their application to Cloud at Work; funds used for a range of services that are provided by their Sage business partner of record. NEW YORK, NY – May 24, 2021 – Cloud at Work (www.thecloudatwork.com), a purpose-built Sage hosting solution, today announced the formal launch of its Partner Development Fund, which makes a total of $1.5 million available for Sage users to spend exclusively with their Sage Business Partner of Record, once they choose Cloud at Work to host their applications. The fund is designed to support Sage’s cloud initiative and incent customers to migrate their Sage applications to Cloud at Work hosting, enabling them to take control of their businesses while fully maximizing Sage application functionality, performance, and availability. The program allows Sage Business Partners to offer their customers a world-class cloud solution, generate recurring revenue within 45 days through a Quick Start Program, and realize the highest margins in the industry. The formal launch of the Partner Development Fund is based on the successful completion of a pilot program that allocated $200K in development funds to Sage Business Partner customers. Sage users that sign on to move to Cloud at Work Hosting will receive a certificate of credit to be spent exclusively with their Sage Business Partner of Record. The funds can be used for any service, including upgrades, new software, services, and migrations. “The Partner Development Fund demonstrates our commitment to, and investment in, the growth of our Partner channel,” said Tyler Bower, Director of Cloud at Cloud at Work. “Our successful pilot was met with great enthusiasm and success, and we’re confident that the $1.5 million in available credits will go a long way in accelerating and increasing recurring revenue among our partners, while providing their customers with a first-rate cloud experience.” The Partner Development Fund is an especially timely program considering how many companies are looking to trusted business partners for solutions that give them increased business productivity and greater  agility as we enter a post-pandemic world, making Cloud at Work’s Sage hosting expertise, the expertise of its Sage Business Partners, and the funds made available for a range of business technology services such a powerful combination. To learn more about the Cloud at Work Partner Program visit thecloudatwork.com/PartnerProgram. About Cloud at Work Cloud at Work gives users of Sage applications more capabilities and control to increase business performance using their technology investments. With a knowledgeable, highly-responsive team of Sage application experts and advanced cloud hosting solutions personalized to customer strengths, Cloud at Work helps its customers pivot more quickly to capitalize on new business opportunities and resolve issues faster. Businesses using Sage trust Cloud at Work to help them achieve higher levels of business productivity and resiliency that outpace competitors and help them capture more market share. Visit thecloudatwork.com for more information.

Moving IT infrastructures to the cloud is gaining popularity, but some companies remain on the fence whether to make the switch or continue with an on-premise system. There are many benefits to consider that may tip the scales in favor of migrating to the cloud, especially now that the power of Sage 100 and Sage 300 is available with Cloud at Work for a solution to help you move to cloud on your own terms. How cloud will improve your business Invest in your business, not hardware. When you have a traditional, in-house data center, you become beholden to maintaining hardware. While updates will help keep everything current for a short time, eventually the hardware will become too aged to continue. Replacing hardware gets expensive, and there will be a need to budget for new equipment on a regular basis. The result is you must balance investing in hardware versus other areas that could grow your business Focus on growing your business. Managing existing IT infrastructure is time-consuming, at times unpredictable, and requires specialized personnel to manage it. With cloud computing, you enable a trusted cloud service provider to manage the complexities of security, upgrades, and maintenance freeing your team up to run the business. Leverage the latest technology. As the company grows, a traditional system can be difficult to expand as needed. You may not have the storage capacity, available users, or even new functionality and compliance that the latest release offers you. Moving to the cloud better enables the scalability that you will need to keep up with the network growth demands. A cloud-based system eliminates that problem by offering scalability in a flash. The Cloud at Work Virtual Private Cloud is a 100% Virtual Private environment geared towards organizations who place extreme value on redundancy, security, and availability. This 100% SLA backed solution provides the most economical way to securely host your Sage software. Now is the time for a cloud-based solution Making a move like this is a lot to think about for your business and your customers, but we’re here to help. We can answer any questions you and your team may have about the transition.

For the past nearly 50 (yes, really) years, businesses building and maintaining their own onsite IT infrastructure was the only game in town. Cloud computing has changed all that. A whopping 61% of businesses migrated at least some of their workloads to the cloud in 2020. Likely your business is already running more than one SaaS hosted application (Microsoft 365 or Dropbox, anyone?), and it’s a guarantee that your employees are. However, many Sage ERP users remain tied to the onsite deployment and the heavy IT burden and costs that go with it. Now is an excellent time to move your Sage ERP to a hosted model. Here are three reasons why you shouldn’t wait any longer to make the move. 1. Take control of your business Sage ERP is likely the backbone of your business operations, with all accounting, sales, inventory, purchasing, manufacturing, project management, and other functions managed through the application. Even short periods of downtime can be devastating, impacting your ability to service customers and zapping employee productivity. Should your server crash, it could take days or weeks to repair or replace it, costing tens of thousands (or more) in expenses and lost revenue. If resiliency, system performance, or security breaches become issues, your organization risks losing ground — and customers — to the competition. In short, Sage ERP is mission-critical, which makes the cloud an ideal place to protect it. With a hosted ERP model, your company’s instance of Sage ERP is hosted on a private cloud services provider’s (CSP) server in a highly secure environment. Private CSPs host your entire production environment in a stable and secure location with 24x7x365 monitoring and support. With near 100% availability guarantees, hourly backup snapshots, and professional disaster recovery services, your Sage ERP data will be safe, and your organization can continue operations, even in the event of a disaster. 2. Increase the value of your company If you are considering merger and acquisition opportunities, an IPO, or a business continuity strategy, you’ll want to maximize your company’s value in every possible way. A company with a bulky in-house computer system — especially when it runs the ERP — could be seen as risky by potential investors. There’s some mystery surrounding an internally hosted IT infrastructure that makes it more difficult for investors to access, understand, value, and maintain going forward. In short, investors demand visibility and accessibility — two things most in-house ERP deployments lack. With the vast majority of workloads either in the cloud or moving to the cloud, the cloud becomes the place to park your Sage ERP. With your hosting company handling all maintenance and support of the system, a budgetable monthly cost, and the cloud deployment providing anytime, anywhere access, investors have a clearer, more concise vision of your operation that’s extremely valuable. 3. Improve employee productivity Labor is the single largest expense for most companies, so it’s of strategic advantage when you can optimize every hour worked. Is it really in your company’s best interest to continue to host and maintain Sage ERP on premise? In addition to the staff time required to keep it running optimally, there’s also the “window within a window” remote access inconvenience that zaps performance and wastes time. Also, in this tight labor market, it’s increasingly difficult (and expensive) to hire and retain talented IT professionals. In short, your human capital may be better spent on activities other than maintaining your ERP application in house. Moving your Sage ERP to a hosted cloud deployment model allows you reallocate IT resources to focus more on growing the business and less on maintaining and updating technology. In addition, cloud deployments provide convenient anytime/anywhere access for your staff — something that proved invaluable during the pandemic. The flexibility, reliability, security, and accessibility provided through a hosted ERP scenario can boost overall productivity and allow you to focus resources more strategically. Your company’s investment in Sage ERP is significant, spans many years — and will perform well for many years to come. But your method of deployment could use an update. Cloud Hosted ERP offers numerous benefits to growing companies, including improved security and backup, better visibility and accessibility, and enhanced employee productivity. As a Sage Cloud Hosting specialist, Cloud at Work understands Sage ERP and will work with you and your Sage partner to make the transition to hosting simple, straightforward, and seamless. Contact us with your questions.

When making the decision to host Sage ERP, you have two main options — hosting by a Public Cloud Services Provider (CSP) or by a Private CSP. We highlighted the differences and why private cloud is the best way to host Sage ERP in this article. But even among private clouds, you have options. You can choose a  “generalist” private CSP that simply offers an alternative to the giant public cloud providers or a “specialist” that focuses on hosting your applications. Choosing a Sage ERP hosting specialist delivers distinct advantages that others simply can’t. 1. Specialists understand Sage Cloud-based ERP applications deployed as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) are designed from the ground up to be hosted remotely. For the CSP, there’s little mystery, little risk, and few surprises with SaaS. In fact, hosting a SaaS application is pretty simple for a CSP — the software publisher handles all the technical nuances required to make it “hostable.” Your Sage ERP application is not a SaaS application, even if it’s hosted remotely. It was not designed to run natively in the cloud. To configure Sage ERP as a Hosted ERP requires knowledge and understanding of the software — attributes a “generalist” private CSP will not possess. Without this knowledge and familiarity, you risk being marooned when something stops working correctly (or never gets started working correctly). Your CSP will refer you to the software publisher or your managed services provider — both of whom may refer you right back to the CSP. It’s a consequence of layers of bureaucracy that define many hosting arrangements. 2. Eliminate the layers You can effectively eliminate the layers and speak straight to the source with a specialist private cloud hosting provider. Cloud at Work is a private CSP specializing in hosting Sage ERP (and CRM and HRMS too). Armed with extensive knowledge and experience about Sage solutions along with unsurpassed cloud expertise, Cloud at Work serves as your single resource for all things hosted. When you have a question about your Hosted ERP, Cloud at Work can be your one call. Working with you and your Sage business partner, we will quickly troubleshoot issues with no runaround and no passing the buck. 3. No compromises There are many myths and misconceptions surrounding private cloud. One of those myths is that private cloud hosting is less secure than hosting offered by the big public cloud guys. Not all private cloud providers provide the same level of security, so you certainly need to evaluate carefully, but in general, hosting Sage ERP on a private cloud is every bit as secure as hosting on a public cloud. Cloud at Work, for example, utilizes identical security protocols as public clouds — and in some instances, even more robust protocols. Cloud at Work’s Tier 4 (highest classification) data centers have 24 x7 x 365 support and monitoring, are geo-diverse, and deliver one to four-hour disaster recovery time objectives. You will not be compromising security (or anything else) when choosing Cloud at Work for Sage ERP hosting. 4. Increased value proposition You may be considering hosting Sage ERP for several reasons, including support for remote work, to reduce operating expenses, to minimize IT costs and burden, and to ensure business continuity. Combined, these reasons form a strong value proposition for hosting, and one only a private cloud specialists like Cloud at Work can fully deliver. There are hidden costs in public cloud deployments and in generalist private cloud deployments — extras that are not included. Support, backups, and remote connections are not included. Software updates, bug fixes, disaster recovery options also are not typically included. These costs will all be your responsibility — which subtracts from the overall value proposition. With a Sage specialist like Cloud at Work responsible for hosting, these critical functions are part of our offering, providing the value and ROI you expect from the cloud. Making the decision to host your Sage ERP application is a smart move. Maximize the benefits of that decision by selecting a Sage specialist like Cloud at Work. One call. No runaround. No compromises.

Earlier, we worked to explain the differences between Public and Private Cloud and why the public cloud is not the best option for hosting your Sage ERP application. While the public cloud is an effective home for SaaS applications, for companies running Sage ERP, private cloud hosting is the single best option. It amplifies the advantages of the cloud while minimizing the traditional disadvantages. Here we look more closely at the differences, benefits, and downsides associated with both public and private cloud hosting options for Sage ERP. Private Cloud Hosting — SaaS minus the sass When we refer to Software as a Service (SaaS), we refer to a software application hosted on a public cloud. Dropbox, Google Sheets, Microsoft Office 365, and Salesforce are common examples of SaaS applications. NetSuite and Acumatica are SaaS ERP applications. Sage 100 and Sage 300 are not SaaS applications. But they can become Cloud applications, and in doing so can capture many of the benefits associated with SaaS. Both Sage 100 and Sage 300 were designed to run on premise. However, both can be hosted in the cloud — becoming what we call Hosted ERP applications. (Read about the differences between Cloud ERP and Hosted ERP.) For businesses, there are clear upsides to SaaS solutions — but there are disadvantages associated too. For example, SaaS ERP users have more limited customization options, they have no control over when the software is updated, and data usage fees can be unpredictable and expensive. A private cloud hosting option shares SaaS solutions’ benefits, but goes further by providing distinct, unique benefits including updates on your schedule, enhanced security, and more extensive customization capabilities. At the risk of confusing the situation, it’s possible to host Sage ERP on a public cloud. That still doesn’t make it a SaaS application — rather, it’s another hosting option in addition to private cloud hosting. And in most ways, it’s an inferior option. Public Cloud Hosting — Still not SaaS It is possible to host your Sage ERP on a public cloud service. However, it’s less than ideal. If you host your Sage ERP on a public cloud, the added layers of bureaucracy between you and your ERP unnecessarily complicate the deployment, adding cost, inconvenience, and frustration. You won’t interact directly with a public cloud provider. Instead, you’ll go through multiple intermediaries that may include a managed services provider (MSP) and a secondary cloud services provider (CSP). Public cloud services like AWS and Azure are not ERP experts and certainly not Sage experts. When you have a question or a problem, it may be challenging to know whether to contact your Sage business partner, your MSP, or your CSP. Depending upon the nature and complexity of the problem, there may be finger-pointing and confusion that increases the time needed to resolve your issue. In addition, there are hidden costs associated with public cloud deployments that tend to punish companies for growing. Quick guide to the differences Below is a quick comparison that helps identify the differences between SaaS ERP, and both a Public Cloud Hosted ERP and a Private Cloud Hosted ERP.   SaaS ERP Public Cloud Hosted ERP Private Cloud Hosted ERP* Predictable monthly IT expenses ✓ ✓ ✓ Lowered IT infrastructure investments ✓ ✓ ✓ Quick set up and deployment ✓ ✓ ✓ Anywhere, anytime accessibility ✓ ✓ ✓ Security handled by hosting provider ✓ Software updates on your schedule ✓ No application limitations ✓ Supports extensive customization ✓ You know who’s actually hosting your application ✓ Hosting provider specializes in ERP – specifically Sage ERP ✓ *Private Cloud service providers vary in the services they provide. This comparison uses Cloud at Work’s offerings as a basis. Private Cloud Hosting for Sage ERP is an ideal way to provide your organization with the many benefits of SaaS ERP applications, without many of the downsides. Private Cloud Hosting makes smart business sense for companies with lengthy investments in Sage ERP who are looking to maximize and revitalize that investment for years to come. Questions about Sage ERP Hosting? Contact us.

There used to be a phrase in the technology space, “Nobody gets fired for buying IBM,” referring to the presumption that the megabrand was the only safe bet. Fast forward thirty years or so, and if you substitute “Microsoft” for “IBM,” the phrase could still ring true. Microsoft Azure is a presumptive choice for many businesses looking for a hosting platform for their business applications, including their Sage ERP. But a presumptive choice is not necessarily the best choice. Public cloud deployments come at a high cost — and much of that cost is hides in layers. What is the true cost of public cloud? X degrees of separation If you select a public cloud provider like Azure to host your Sage ERP application, you’ll quickly find it’s a relationship that involves layers. Lots of layers. You will likely never have direct contact with Microsoft; your relationship with them will go through intermediaries such as a cloud services provider (CSP). In some cases, there may more than one intermediary CSP. If you rely on a managed services provider (MSP), they’ll be one of the layers too. It’s worth noting here that none of those layers is familiar with Sage ERP. Why do layers matter? Layers matter because they create bottlenecks, finger-pointing, and delays when something goes wrong. If you cannot log in to your Sage ERP application, who’s fault is it? If you receive an error message, which layer takes responsibility for fixing it? What value do you place on the potential productivity and revenue losses associated with downtime? What? That’s not included? We find that companies considering hosting their Sage ERP application often have misconceptions about what Azure provides as part of the public cloud hosting arrangement. Support, backups, remote connections — not included. Software updates, bug fixes, disaster recovery options — not included. These will all be your responsibility. To get a real SaaS experience, you’ll need to turn to one of your layers or your internal IT staff to handle the details that Azure does not. This leads us to another common misconception. A primary reason that companies cite for moving to a Hosted ERP model is the reduced need for IT resources. In many cases, though, the IT load remains the same or even increases. This can happen when your internal IT personnel or your outsourced IT firm has to spend more time managing the layers — communicating and troubleshooting on your behalf. You, of course, will be paying for that time. Punished for growth One of the most complicated pricing models in the tech industry is public cloud providers’ data usage fee structure. You may be told you’ll pay only for what you use, but it’s exceedingly difficult to estimate usage — and overage costs are high. We’ve had clients move to our Cloud at Work Sage ERP private hosted platform because of frustration with unpredictable and expensive data usage charges. Some tell us they felt like they were being punished for growing. To calculate the true cost of public cloud, you must factor in the additional costs associated with bringing your Sage ERP to life on the public cloud — and the ongoing costs of supporting it and maintaining it there. You should also factor in your risk tolerance surrounding troubleshooting and downtime. With layers in between you and Azure, and each asking for a piece of the pie, the true cost can be much higher than expected.

For the past nearly 50 (yes, really) years, businesses building and maintaining their own onsite IT infrastructure was the only game in town. Cloud computing has changed all that. A whopping 61% of businesses migrated at least some of their workloads to the cloud in 2020. Likely your business is already running more than one SaaS hosted application (Microsoft 365 or Dropbox, anyone?), and it’s a guarantee that your employees are. However, many Sage 300 users remain tied to the onsite deployment and the heavy IT burden and costs that go with it. Now is an excellent time to move your Sage 300 to a hosted model. Here are three reasons why you shouldn’t wait any longer to make the move. 1. Take control of your business Sage 300 is likely the backbone of your business operations, with all accounting, sales, inventory, purchasing, manufacturing, project management, and other functions managed through the application. Even short periods of downtime can be devastating, impacting your ability to service customers and zapping employee productivity. Should your server crash, it could take days or weeks to repair or replace it, costing tens of thousands (or more) in expenses and lost revenue. If resiliency, system performance, or security breaches become issues, your organization risks losing ground — and customers — to the competition. In short, Sage 300 is mission-critical, which makes the cloud an ideal place to protect it. With a hosted Sage 300 ERP model, your company’s instance of Sage 300 is hosted on a private cloud services provider’s (CSP) server in a highly secure environment. Private CSPs host your entire production environment in a stable and secure location with 24x7x365 monitoring and support. With near 100% availability guarantees, hourly backup snapshots, and professional disaster recovery services, your hosted Sage 300 data will be safe, and your organization can continue operations, even in the event of a disaster. 2. Increase the value of your company If you are considering merger and acquisition opportunities, an IPO, or a business continuity strategy, you’ll want to maximize your company’s value in every possible way. A company with a bulky in-house computer system — especially when it runs the ERP — could be seen as risky by potential investors. There’s some mystery surrounding an internally hosted IT infrastructure that makes it more difficult for investors to access, understand, value, and maintain going forward.In short, investors demand visibility and accessibility — two things most in-house ERP deployments lack. With the vast majority of workloads either in the cloud or moving to the cloud, the cloud becomes the place to park your Sage 300. With your hosting company handling all maintenance and support of the system, a budgetable monthly cost, and the cloud deployment providing anytime, anywhere access, investors have a clearer, more concise vision of your operation that’s extremely valuable. 3. Improve employee productivity Labor is the single largest expense for most companies, so it’s of strategic advantage when you can optimize every hour worked. Is it really in your company’s best interest to continue to host and maintain Sage 300 on premise? In addition to the staff time required to keep it running optimally, there’s also the “window within a window” remote access inconvenience that zaps performance and wastes time. Also, in this tight labor market, it’s increasingly difficult (and expensive) to hire and retain talented IT professionals. In short, your human capital may be better spent on activities other than maintaining your Sage 300 ERP application in house. Moving your Sage 300 to a hosted cloud deployment model allows you reallocate IT resources to focus more on growing the business and less on maintaining and updating technology. In addition, cloud deployments provide convenient anytime/anywhere access for your staff — something that proved invaluable during the pandemic. The flexibility, reliability, security, and accessibility provided through a hosted ERP scenario can boost overall productivity and allow you to focus resources more strategically. Your company’s investment in Sage 300 is significant, spans many years — and will perform well for many years to come. But your method of deployment could use an update. Cloud Hosted ERP offers numerous benefits to growing companies, including improved security and backup, better visibility and accessibility, and enhanced employee productivity. As a Sage Cloud Hosting specialist, Cloud at Work understands Sage 300 and will work with you and your Sage partner to make the transition to hosting simple, straightforward, and seamless. Contact us with your questions.

As you consider moving Sage ERP to a cloud deployment, you’ve got several decisions to make. Earlier, we offered some suggestions on how to choose a Sage cloud hosting provider. Before you make that decision, though, you’ll need to make a more fundamental decision — should you choose a public or private cloud deployment? What are the differences between the two and which is the best option for hosting Sage ERP? What is Public Cloud? Public clouds are the most common type of cloud computing deployment. With a public cloud deployment, the cloud resources (think servers and storage) are owned and operated by a third-party cloud service provider and delivered over the internet. All hardware, operating system software, and other supporting infrastructure are also owned and managed by the cloud provider. In a public cloud, you share the same hardware, storage, and network devices with other organizations or cloud tenants. You access your software applications and manage your account using a web browser. Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, and AWS are examples of public cloud services. What is Private Cloud? A private cloud consists of cloud computing resources used exclusively by one business or organization. In some cases, an organization’s private cloud could be physically located on their premises. A more common situation, though, is the hosted private cloud. These clouds are maintained by third-party providers (like Cloud at Work) but are unique to one company. In a hosted private cloud, cloud storage isn’t partitioned between users as is the case with public clouds. Instead, each cloud is for the use of an individual customer. The cloud hosting provider maintains the services and infrastructure on a secure network used only by you. The hardware and operating system software are dedicated solely to your organization. This arrangement provides the same benefits as a public cloud – no on-site resources needed to manage cloud storage – with the added security and flexibility of a private cloud. You access your software applications through a secure internet portal. Advantages of a private cloud deployment Public and private cloud deployments share many of the same advantages, including a lowered IT burden, anytime/anywhere access, and more predictable monthly technology expenditures. However, private cloud deployments offer some unique advantages over public options, including: Increased flexibility ‑ When the cloud provider isn’t serving millions of customers, there’s a lot more room for flexibility. A private cloud provider can customize its cloud environment to meet your organization’s specific business needs rather than forcing you to accept high-level choices made to best satisfy as many customers as possible, like how public clouds operate. More control – Public cloud customers have no real way to change things should services or functionality fail to meet their requirements. If a cloud provider changes available features, discontinues functionality, or chooses to adjust any other aspect of operations, there’s nothing you can do about it. Private cloud customers have more input and control over the functionality and operation of their deployment. Enhanced security—In a private cloud, resources are not shared with others, so higher control and privacy levels are possible. Monitoring for a private cloud is generally far superior to public alternatives since it’s easier for the provider to identify small signs of weakness and act immediately. Additionally, you have more flexibility in the security measures used with private clouds. When using public clouds, you’re reliant on whatever measures the provider put into place. Better service—By eliminating intermediaries, a private cloud provider can be much more responsive than the behemoth public cloud providers. And, in the case of Cloud at Work, our level of service extends beyond the technology infrastructure. As Sage experts, we’re able to work with you and your business partner when issues arrive to get them resolved quickly. A public cloud provider simply cannot offer that level of service. Why public cloud is not the best for hosting Sage ERP Public cloud is not the best option for hosting Sage ERP. The added layers of bureaucracy between you and your ERP unnecessarily complicate the deployment, adding cost, inconvenience, and frustration. The overwhelming majority of companies that use the major public cloud services will never directly interact with the giants. Most companies’ relationships with their public cloud service provider pass through many layers, including a managed services provider and often another smaller cloud services provider. In fact, in most instances, you won’t even choose  the public cloud provider directly — a company in one of those layers will choose it for you. When you put layers in between you and your vital business software, you risk finger-pointing and delays should an issue arise. It’s unlikely that AWS will even pick up the phone when you call, let alone help you troubleshoot an issue they don’t believe they have responsibility for. Cloud at Work is a private cloud service that works directly with Sage ERP users and their business partners to host Sage ERP in our own world-class data centers. When you experience an issue, one call to Cloud at Work sets a resolution in motion. No layers and no finger pointing. It’s an application focus and a level of service that other cloud services providers — public or private — simply cannot match. Do you have questions about moving Sage ERP to the cloud? We welcome the opportunity to answer your questions and discuss how Cloud at Work may be the ideal fit for your organization. Give us a call at 800-719-3307.

Companies are moving their ERP applications to the Cloud in ever-increasing numbers. But you have an investment in Sage ERP that is still paying dividends. You’re not about to trade in the ERP solution that’s been serving your organization so well for so long, and Sage continues to invest in their ERP solutions, giving you added confidence that you’re still on the right path. Perhaps, though, there’s a cloud hanging over your on-premise Sage implementation. Maybe the pandemic and the work-from-home shift brought a little rain. You may be wondering if you could have all the benefits of your Sage application and all the benefits of a cloud-hosted ERP. Could migrating to a hosted ERP deployment be the answer? If you’ve got questions about moving Sage X3, Sage 500, Sage 300, or Sage 100 to the Cloud, we’ve got answers. Why is now the right time to move Sage ERP to the cloud? Now is an excellent time to make the move to a Hosted ERP deployment model for many reasons, including: Remote Access: The work-from-home shift is likely to continue and may become a permanent change for many companies. A Hosted ERP model provides straightforward and secure accessibility for remote employees. IT resources are in short supply: It can be challenging to find, hire, and retain in-house IT personnel capable of maintaining your company’s servers and technology infrastructure. A Hosted ERP model minimizes your organization’s IT burden, allowing you to redirect those resources to more value-added initiatives. Peace of mind: Data security risks are a constant concern. In a hosted environment, a cloud services provider (CSP) hosts your entire production environment in a stable and secure setting, with round-the-clock monitoring and support. Many CSPs offer uptime availability guarantees as high as 99.99%, and with hourly backups, you can be confident that even in the event of a disaster, your data will be safe. What are the advantages of moving to a Sage hosted ERP model? Sage Hosting offers numerous advantages over an on-premises deployment, including: Leverage your investment: Sage applications are robust, comprehensive ERP applications that have been growing in functionality for decades. The solution you’re using today has been tested, improved, and extended with capabilities to run enterprise organizations’ entire operations. Moving to a hosted ERP model allows you to best leverage the continuing value of the application. Through hosting, you gain access to modern infrastructure that will enable you to continue to take full advantage of your ERP solution for years to come. Additionally, you may have code customizations added throughout the years, and since your whole business data set moves to the hosted environment, those customizations will come right along with you. Fixed monthly cost: With most Hosted ERP deployments, you’ll pay a fixed monthly fee for the services you select. No more worries about server updates or budgeting for hardware upgrades. One set monthly fee buys you quick, anytime, anywhere access to your Sage applications, without the technology overhead costs. Data security: When you’re operating your own on-premises servers, you retain complete control over security. For a business with an appropriate level of IT support, on-premise solutions can provide a level of confidence that the servers are locked down. On the other hand, if mismanaged, on-premise servers can leave an organization vulnerable to security threats. Unlike data centers, which hire dedicated security personnel and are built to withstand acts of nature such as fires, your office can be more susceptible to break-ins and weather events, which pose significant threats to your servers and your data. Data security in the cloud is handled by your CSP. Reputable CSPs take their data security responsibilities very seriously. Most rely on the very latest and most sophisticated security tools to keep customers’ data safe. And most are equipped with 24/7 support and monitoring and perform regular (even hourly) data backups. How do I select the right company to host my Sage ERP? Finding the right company to host your Sage ERP is a crucial decision, so it’s vital to study your options and make an informed choice. Cloud Service Providers (CSP) are technology companies offering cloud-based platforms that could include infrastructure, application hosting and storage services. Big names like Microsoft Azure, AWS, and Google Cloud come to mind, but when looking for a CSP to host your Sage ERP, bigger isn’t better. You won’t be able to work directly with one of these big players. Instead, you’ll need to work through a few layers, such as a Managed Services Provider (MSP) and even likely an intermediary CSP. All those layers can result in long wait times for support and finger-pointing between vendors as they try to resolve a support issue. A CSP that also understands your Sage ERP application is ideal — and Cloud at Work is that kind of CSP. We understand Sage ERP solutions and the companies that rely on them — and that makes a difference. We’ve got more tips on selecting the right CSP here. Cloud at Work is a Sage hosting provider, delivering cloud hosting options all Sage applications. We work with Sage customers and their Sage business partners to provide the most streamlined, cost-effective, and robust hosting experience available. Contact us with your questions.