Evaluation of Cloud Cost Optimization Tools

We’ve looked at a number of cloud cost optimization tools in house and for customers.  This is a brief breakdown of some of the characteristics and features of the programs.  Please realize that this is a very fast moving part of the industry.  If you decision hinges on a single feature, it’s availability may have changed by the time you read this sentence.

package	direct cloud support	import data support	deployment method	cost aggregation	shared access	RI calcs.	cap. planning	general monitoring	project breakdown	price basis
Cloudyn	AWS, GCE	no, on roadmap for enterprise	SaaS	yes		yes	yes- premium product	cost monitoring only	AWS and GCE tags	free, premium $240 up to $200k spend
teevity	AWS, Google, Azure	yes, using Dropbox	SaaS, AWS install	yes	yes, via email	yes	no	cost report/daily email	yes,can split cost as well as gather	free for the basic cost monitor with a tiered pricing for more functions.
cloudexpress	AWS, Rackspac, Azure, more...		SaaS	yes		yes	yes		organization, application, environment (production, test, development)	free basic tier
kaavo	EC2, CloudStack, Eucalyptus, HP, Logicworks, OpenStack, RackSpace, Terremark, vCloud Director	no	Saas, on-premise		yes		yes	yes
cloudability	AWS/EC2		SaaS	yes	yes	yes	yes	no	yes by tag	three tiers, free/pro/ent - pro based on cloud spend tracked
cloud vertical	AWS, Heroku, VMWare private clouds	VMware Vsphere, Citrix XenServer, Microsoft HyperV or Private Cloud platforms like vCloud Director, OpenStack or CloudStack	SaaS	in enterprise	in enterprise			alerts	yes	scales on spend tracked
cloudCheckr	AWS, AWS GovCloud	no	SaaS	yes	yes	yes	yes	alerts based on thresholds, regualr scans of "best-practices"	yes	tiered fixed cost based on total spend tracked

Column key:

package - Name of the package.

URL - click the name of the package (link)

direct cloud support - The clouds that it can track costs on it’s own without any data munging by you.

import data support - Can it import records from outside sources, such as munged data or private clouds which might not be directly accessible.

deployment method - Where does the code run?

cost aggregation - Does it aggregate basic costs?

shared access - Does it support more than one user logging in? DOes it support reporting to more than one person?

RI calculations - Does it do modeling to determine where Reserved Instances would save money? (RIs are pre-purchased computing available in AWS).

cap. planning

general monitoring - Does the product do any type of alerting other than cost based? (on example: unused but paid for storage)

project breakdown - Can the product do cost breakdown by projects or groups of resources?

price basis - What is the basic concept by which they charge?