Full FinOps solution, that won't break the bank
Updated June 16, 2023

Full FinOps solution, that won't break the bank

David James Chiswell | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 8 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Modules Used

  • Cloudability

Overall Satisfaction with Apptio Cloudability

We have a very large, diverse Azure environment that many departments have apps/services in. It is an easy way to segregate, and break down costs as needed without giving users access to the actual Azure Portal itself. The speed to create dashboards, or run reports is a big advantage when departments need viability of their owns costs.
  • Visibility of reserved instances, and recommendations for further savings
  • Right sizing suggestions based on VM utilization
  • Dashboards - easy to add widgets for quick visibility of desired metrics
  • I'd like see the actual VM name in reservation portfolio, rather than the reservation ID
  • I find the speed in which the changes are applied a frustration. E.g if you add a business mapping, you often have to wait 24hrs or more for the data to fully process.
  • The user management seems a little clunky, I preferred it when it was part of the actual Cloudy portal, rather that through access administration.
  • We have seen some substantial cost reductions as a direct result of rightsizing/utilzation suggestions. An estimated 18% per month
  • Greater visibility of allocation of spend, highlights areas to concentrate on for potential reductions, or justification
  • Positive engagement with service owners from other departments so they are now able to have insights of their spend, this was not possible before without manual reports being generated form Azure portal
The interface is quite intuitive and pretty self explanatory. The initial setup wasn't particularly easy, but Apptio support are always on hand and responsive to assist. The views and business mappings really useful tools to to separate sources/departments.Tag explorer is also very useful for seeing untagged spend.
  • Targetprocess
N/A we currently only use Cloudabilty
Cloudabilty was implemented before I joined the organization, so apart from the Azure costings blade, I have no experience of alternatives.

Do you think Apptio Cloudability delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with Apptio Cloudability's feature set?

Yes

Did Apptio Cloudability live up to sales and marketing promises?

I wasn't involved with the selection/purchase process

Did implementation of Apptio Cloudability go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy Apptio Cloudability again?

Yes

It is very malleable so I like how easily custom views can be created for service owners to view specific costs of items of interest to them. It is useful how easily you can segregate/filter resources from each other. There is an associated administrative overhead, particularly when adding new users to the system, this is maybe more of a shortcoming from my organization, rather than the product itself though.

Using Apptio Cloudability

10 - Senior managment/Team managers and Cloud admins
1 - Certified Microsoft Azure administrator, and FinOps certified
  • Views of actual spend
  • Forecasting costs
  • Rightsizing recommendations
  • Compute utilization
  • Apptio BI
  • Customizable dashboards/views
  • Business mappings to caputure untaggable spend
  • Multi cloud platforms
Product mayne not used to it's full capacity by us, nethertheless, useful

Evaluating Apptio Cloudability and Competitors

  • Cloud Solutions
  • Integration with Other Systems
  • Ease of Use
It can capture both Azure & AWS costs. Simple dashboards to share with stakeholders
N/A - Product satisfies our needs fully

Apptio Cloudability Implementation

Apptio Cloudability Training

Training was adequate, but the real learning begins when you start using the product, like most things. All major functions were covered so as an entry point, was a good introduction to the product. The training pace was good as well, the areas were covered in decent depth, without being too much of an information overload.
Easy and intuitive, plenty of FAQ's and online documemntation available

Configuring Apptio Cloudability

Very configurable, but emphasis seems to be on adequate tagging of the environment
Tagging/labelling the environment can save a lot of effort in the long run
No - we have not done any customization to the interface
No - we have not done any custom code
N/A Built in features serve our needs adequately

Apptio Cloudability Support

Very responsive, knowledgeable staff and quick resolutions to issues
ProsCons
Quick Resolution
Good followup
Knowledgeable team
Problems get solved
Kept well informed
No escalation required
Immediate help available
Support understands my problem
Quick Initial Response
None
I'm not sure, I wasn't involved in contract negotiations, although the support is more than adequate
Yes - Had some issues with cost duplications, solved in a timely manner
Every time I have needed assistance, the service can't be faulted.

Using Apptio Cloudability

ProsCons
Relatively simple
Technical support not required
Well integrated
Quick to learn
Convenient
Feel confident using
Familiar
Difficult to use
  • Dashboards
  • Business Mappings
  • Custom Views
  • Account Groups
  • Some of the optimization features are a little clunky

Apptio Cloudability Reliability

Works as designed
Only been 1 or 2 occaisions when not available, in 3 years
Afternoons tend to be a little slower, due to US traffic I assume

Integrating Apptio Cloudability

Adequate support and advice is always at hand if/when needed
  • AWS
  • Azure
Simple process, processes are documented well
  • Single Signon
  • API (e.g. SOAP or REST)
We extract some data for displaying certain metrics in Power BI, we intergrated Cloudy with our on prem AD servers for SSO
Keep apptio support at hand

Relationship with Apptio

Very good comms, eagerness to help
Great working relationship
I wasn't involved in this process
I wasn't personally involved, but all dealings with Apptio have been easy
Vendor makes processes very easy in my experience. Although it is advantageous to have a clear idea of want you want from the product

Upgrading Apptio Cloudability

Yes - Down time was longer than anticpated, but comms with support was clear and open at all times
  • Rightsizing
  • Utilization
  • Optimization features