In today's business environments, the way workforces operate has changed, they are now centrally operated instead of being scattered across platforms. The businesses are now opting to provision work from home, for employees spread across countries adding new challenges to the IT departments.
The quick hardware acquisition, setting them up for the corporate work environment, and delivering them to remote employees involves the labour of numerous IT managers and logistics, increasing the expense.
Therefore, IT departments are under a great deal of pressure to provide their staff with a safe, controlled and professional work environment. These decisions will undoubtedly affect revenue, security protocols, and employee happiness in general.
With Neverinstall’s VDI, organisations can significantly reduce the time required to deploy the configured workspaces to employees from weeks to just less than 30 minutes.
To begin with,
What is VDI?
By virtualizing desktops on a centralised server, VDI allows users to access their workspaces from anywhere, using any device. This leap forward in desktop management brings scalability, agility, and control over IT resources, establishing VDI as a cornerstone of modern business infrastructure.
Capital Expenditure on Hardware
The average device cost escalates as organisations invest in additional security measures, contributing to heightened expenditures beyond the initial purchase
Let’s take a look at a quick cost breakdown.
Macbooks
An employees laptop roughly gets replaced every two years. Most developers use a Macbook. For the standard developer today, providing a 32GB M1 Macbook which costs roughly $2900. Spread that across two years, and that comes out to roughly $1500 per developer/employee per year.
Cloud PCs
For a new world with remote ephemeral workspaces, the cost considerations are slightly different. Rather than buying a beefy Macbook, we would instead buy a standard M1 Macbook, which comes in at roughly $1000. This would bring the laptop cost per developer down to $500 per year but we still need to account for the new Cloud costs.
The evolving software demands can surpass the hardware specifications of purchased devices, necessitating further upgrades and impacting overall expenses.
Problems and limitations of non-centralised device allocation
When discussing the problems and limitations of non-centralized device allocation for employees, particularly concerning costs, and comparing these with CapEx (Capital Expenditure) investments in buying devices, several key aspects need to be considered:
Non-Centralized Device Allocation: This approach often requires significant upfront investment in purchasing a variety of devices, leading to high CapEx. The cost can vary greatly depending on the types and specifications of the devices.
Maintenance and Repair Costs: Different types of devices may require unique maintenance and repair strategies, leading to unpredictable and often higher maintenance costs. The lack of standardization can also increase the cost of spare parts and repairs.
Device Depreciation: Different devices will have different lifespans and rates of obsolescence, leading to irregular replacement cycles and costs. All devices will depreciate over time, and technology obsolescence can render them outdated. This necessitates further CapEx for replacement, which can be costly over time.
Scalability Costs: Scaling up or down can be costly and inefficient, as it involves acquiring or disposing of diverse types of hardware. Scaling up requires additional upfront purchases while scaling down leaves unused devices, which can be a financial burden.
CapEx Investments in Buying Devices: Purchasing individual devices requires a significant upfront investment, especially when acquiring a large number of devices for an entire organisation or educational institution.
Software Licensing Costs: Additional software is used to integrate with every device to add layers of security.
Logistics: Shipping physical devices to remote employees involves direct logistics costs such as packaging, transportation, and tracking services, contributing to the overall expenses of deploying individual devices. Delivery time also affects the speed at which employees can access work.
The True Cost of VDI: Breaking Down Expenses
Traditional VDI costs used to be complex due to factors like licensing models, user types, and additional features. Different vendors offer varying pricing structures based on concurrent users, named users, or resource allocation, adding to the intricacy. Additionally, hidden costs may arise from required infrastructure investments, ongoing support, egress cost, power cooling costs and scalability needs, making it challenging for organizations to estimate the total cost of ownership accurately.
At Neverinstall, our transparent pricing eliminates hidden charges, providing organizations with simplicity and clarity for informed decision-making on implementation costs.
Below are the cost components involved,
Cloud Cost
Cloud cost depends on the specifications of the Cloud PC and the hours of usage. Cloud costs can vary based on factors like resource usage, and instance types. At Neverinstall, we meticulously analyze user requirements and leverage our expertise to provision the optimal cloud instance from our cloud partners. This ensures not only the best performance but also cost efficiency, aligning with user needs and offering competitive pricing for a tailored cloud solution.
At Neverinstall, the VDI desktops are built to have predictable cloud costs making this an affordable solution for enterprises.
Support and Management Services
If you opt for managed services or require dedicated support, these services will add to the total cost.
Security and Compliance
Neverinstall comes with standard compliances like, GDPR, SOC 2 and ISO. Implementing and maintaining additional security could add on to the cost. Read up here for additional information on how Neverinstall's privacy is built in - https://blog.neverinstall.com/data-privacy-with-neverinstall/
Storage Costs
The amount of data storage you require for your cloud PC can significantly impact costs. This includes not only the storage of files and applications but also backups and snapshots for data protection and recovery.
Network Bandwidth Costs
Data transfer in and out of the cloud can incur costs, especially if there's a high volume of data movement. Some cloud providers offer a certain amount of free data transfer, but charges apply for data transfer beyond that limit.
Software Licensing Cost
Neverinstall’s software licensing cost will be included in the costing. The licensing cost only depends on the number of users an organisation is onboarding into Neverinstall.
Optimising VDI Deployment: Cost-Effective Strategies From Neverinstall
Auto pause
An innovative feature addressing uncontrolled cloud billing, primarily caused by unused hours, to effectively curb escalating operational costs in the cloud. The instances are paused when there is an inactivity for 15 minutes (customizable). This saves the users from paying for unused/idle cloud resources. These paused instances can be resumed whenever. This reduces cloud costs by up to 30%. This feature works for both Neverinstall Cloud and CloudLink.
Data Consumption Optimisation and Compression
Embedded within the streaming logic is a lower data consumption algorithm, ensuring consistent performance even in environments with internet speeds less than 10Mbps. This optimization not only maintains seamless operation but also contributes to a notable reduction in egress costs. This is meticulously engineered to establish predictability and consistency in egress costs, offering businesses greater financial control. Optimizing and managing egress costs helps us provide the solution at a comparative price
Cloud Partnerships
By forging strategic partnerships with cloud providers, Neverinstall is able to secure favourable pricing and resource optimization for its Desktop-as-a-Service (DaaS) offerings, thus reducing overall costs. These collaborations enable access to scalable infrastructure and advanced technologies at lower rates, making DaaS more affordable and efficient for end-users.
How DAAS and VDI solutions can be more cost-effective
In a VDI setup, updates, patches, and software installations are managed centrally. This means IT Admins don't have to spend time installing updates or troubleshooting software issues on their individual machines, as everything is maintained at the server level.
With instant provisioning and access, users can be onboarded to their Cloud PCs within seconds, minimising downtime and enhancing productivity from the get-go. This significantly enhances the productivity of the IT team.
- Optimise the workflow
- Reduce dependency on the IT department
- Management of Cloud PCs.
Small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) can embrace VDIs without the need for extensive IT team investments. VDI solutions offer user-friendly interfaces and centralised management, enabling SMBs to efficiently implement and maintain virtual desktop environments without a dedicated IT team. This cost-effective approach enhances accessibility and productivity for SMBs venturing into virtualisation.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the shift towards remote and distributed workforces has necessitated a reevaluation of traditional IT infrastructure and device management strategies. Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), and specifically Neverinstall's VDI solution, offers a compelling alternative that addresses many of the challenges faced by modern businesses. By centralising desktop environments on a cloud-based platform, organisations can significantly reduce capital expenditures on hardware, streamline IT management processes, and enhance security and compliance measures. Furthermore, features like auto-pause and data compression optimize operational costs and improve efficiency, making VDI an attractive option for businesses of all sizes. As the need for flexible, scalable, and cost-effective IT solutions continues to grow, adopting VDI technology like Neverinstall's offers a forward-looking approach that can adapt to evolving business requirements, ultimately driving productivity, reducing overheads, and enhancing employee satisfaction. Embracing VDI is not just a technological upgrade; it's a strategic investment in the future of work.
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