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1. What is the cloud?
The cloud is computing power, storage, and software that you rent over the internet instead of owning and operating them in your own server room. It works much like electricity from a power outlet – you do not have to manage the power plant, and you pay for what you use. The servers still physically exist, but they are located in the provider's data center and managed by the provider. For you, this means getting additional capacity in minutes rather than months.
2. What is the difference between public, private, and hybrid cloud?
Public cloud (AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud) uses the provider's infrastructure to serve multiple customers who are logically separated from one another. Private cloud is infrastructure dedicated exclusively to your company – either in your own data center or hosted by a provider. Hybrid cloud combines both approaches: sensitive systems remain on-premises, while others run in the public cloud. In practice, many Slovak companies today use a hybrid model, at least during the transition period.
3. What do IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS mean?
These are three different levels based on how much responsibility you leave to the provider. IaaS (Infrastructure as a Service) provides virtual servers, networking, and storage – you manage the operating system and applications yourself. PaaS (Platform as a Service) also takes care of the operating system, database, or runtime, while you provide your code. SaaS (Software as a Service) is a complete application that you simply use – for example, Microsoft 365 or Salesforce. The further you move up this scale, the less operational work you have to manage, but the fewer things you can customize.
4. Is the cloud only for large companies?
No. In fact, quite the opposite. Large companies can afford to operate their own data centers, while small and medium-sized businesses often cannot. The cloud gives them access to the same technologies as large corporations without the upfront investment. An accounting firm with ten employees can run on infrastructure with the same level of security as a bank. The difference is simply how much capacity it uses.
5. What can run in the cloud and what cannot?
Technically, almost anything can run in the cloud today – from email and accounting software to manufacturing information systems. Limitations are more often regulatory, such as requirements to store data within the EU; contractual, such as licensing restrictions for legacy systems; or practical, such as systems connected to machinery on a factory floor that need to remain physically nearby.
A sensible starting point is therefore an inventory: what systems do we have, who uses them, and what data do they contain? Only then does it make sense to decide what should move to the cloud first.
6. Is data in the cloud secure?
Physically and technically, the data centers of major cloud providers are better protected than most companies could achieve with their own server rooms – including 24/7 security, redundant power supplies, and certifications such as ISO 27001 and SOC 2. However, most cloud security incidents are not caused by provider failures, but by misconfigurations on the customer side: incorrectly configured permissions, publicly accessible storage, or weak passwords without multi-factor authentication. The cloud is therefore only as secure as the way you use it.
7. Who is responsible for security – us or the provider?
Both, and the boundary is clearly defined by the shared responsibility model. The provider is responsible for security of the cloud – buildings, hardware, networks, and the underlying platform. You are responsible for security in the cloud – your data, user access, configuration, and applications. It is like renting a safe deposit box at a bank: the bank protects the building, but the key to your box and what you put inside it are your responsibility.
8. Where is our data physically stored?
Wherever you choose. Major cloud providers offer regions around the world, and when creating a service, you select the region where your data will be stored – for Slovak companies, this is typically Frankfurt, Vienna, Warsaw, or Stockholm. Your choice of region is important for GDPR and sector-specific regulations, so it should be a deliberate decision rather than simply a default setting.
9. What about GDPR and other regulations – is cloud even allowed?
Yes. When properly configured and managed, cloud services can fully comply with GDPR and are also used by banks, insurance companies, and public authorities. The key is to select an appropriate EU region for personal data, have a data processing agreement in place with the provider – which major providers offer as standard – and be able to demonstrate who has access to the data.
Regulated industries also have their own requirements, such as DORA in the financial sector. These regulations do not prevent the use of cloud services, but they require more thorough controls and documentation.
10. What happens if the cloud provider goes down?
Outages can happen even to the largest providers, but cloud architectures can be designed to operate across multiple independent data centers or availability zones. If one location fails, workloads can continue running elsewhere.
The key question is therefore not whether a provider can experience an outage, but whether your system has been designed to withstand the failure of a single location. For critical systems, this level of resilience is often essential. For less critical internal tools, it may be unnecessary.
11. Is the cloud cheaper than running your own servers?
It depends on how you use it. The cloud replaces a large upfront investment with ongoing payments based on consumption, making it particularly attractive for variable workloads, rapid growth, or short-term projects. For stable, fully utilized infrastructure that you operate for years, your own hardware may be cheaper.
However, the real savings are rarely just about the cost of servers. They come from not having to wait for new infrastructure, not buying capacity five years in advance, and not having your people spend their time replacing disks and maintaining hardware.
12. Why do companies often spend more on cloud than they planned?
Most often because cloud resources are easy to turn on and easy to forget about. A test environment that nobody shut down, a server sized for ten times the actual workload, or data being transferred between regions – each individual cost may be small, but together they add up every month.
Another reason is that cloud spending is often not assigned to a specific person, so nobody feels directly responsible for it. The solution is not to leave the cloud, but to establish simple rules: every resource should have an owner, a budget, and a defined expiration date.
13. How can cloud costs be kept under control?
Three simple steps. First, tag every resource by project or department so you can see who is spending what. Second, set budgets and alerts – cloud providers can automatically notify you when spending approaches a defined limit. Third, regularly review unused resources, ideally every month, and shut them down.
Companies that do this consistently can often save 20 to 30 percent without affecting operations.
14. How do you pay for cloud services?
Primarily based on actual consumption: seconds or hours of server runtime, gigabytes of stored data, or the number of service requests. There is no large upfront investment, and billing is typically monthly.
If you know that you will need a certain amount of capacity over the long term, you can commit for one or three years and receive discounts of 30 to 70 percent compared with standard pay-as-you-go pricing. A good strategy combines both approaches – a stable base covered by long-term commitments and additional capacity paid for according to actual consumption.
15. How do we measure whether the cloud was worth it?
Do not measure only the infrastructure bill. It tells only half the story. Compare how long it took to launch a new project before and after the migration, how much downtime you experienced, and how much time your people spend on maintenance instead of development.
Add the costs you no longer have to pay – electricity, physical space, hardware replacement, and licenses. Cloud ROI rarely becomes fully visible in the first year. Companies typically see the benefits after migration and subsequent optimization, often during the second or third year.
16. How should we start moving to the cloud?
Start with a small, non-critical system where you can learn how the cloud works within your environment – often a website, backup solution, or test environment. Do not start with your accounting system or core database.
At the same time, create an inventory of all your systems and divide them into three groups: those that can move to the cloud easily, those that will require modifications, and those that should remain where they are for now. Your first successful project will teach you more than any study.
17. Do we need to rewrite our applications to run in the cloud?
Not necessarily. The simplest approach, known as lift-and-shift, moves an existing server to the cloud as it is. It works, but you will not benefit from most of the cloud's advantages and may end up paying more.
A better approach is gradual modernization: move the database to a managed service, break the application into smaller components, and automate backup and scaling. A complete rewrite only makes sense for systems that are already outdated and would need to be replaced regardless of the move to the cloud.
18. How long does a migration take?
A simple system can be migrated in a matter of days. A typical medium-sized company with dozens of applications may need 6 to 18 months to migrate most of them.
The data transfer itself is rarely what takes the most time. Preparation does – understanding dependencies between systems, testing, training people, and resolving licensing issues. This is why it makes sense to migrate in waves rather than all at once. Each wave reduces risk and provides lessons for the next one.
19. Won't we become dependent on a single provider?
Some level of dependency always exists – just as you may already depend on your accounting software provider or server manufacturer. You can reduce this dependency by using open standards, containers, Infrastructure as Code, and ensuring that your data can always be exported.
However, trying to be "multicloud" from day one and running everything across multiple providers often costs more than the dependency you are trying to avoid. A sensible goal is to be able to leave, not to be constantly moving between providers.
20. Do we need our own cloud experts?
You definitely need at least one person who understands the cloud – someone who can evaluate proposed solutions, understand the bill, and communicate with suppliers on equal terms.
However, you do not need to build an entire in-house cloud team. Operations, migration, and security monitoring can all be handled with the support of an experienced partner.
More important than the number of certifications is giving your existing IT people the time and opportunity to learn cloud technologies. Some of the best cloud specialists within companies are former server administrators who were given the opportunity to develop their skills.
SP Software Solutions | Just Cloud IT
