Security & efficiency
benefits of moving to SaaS
Why the time is right to move to Software as a Service
Under attack
We live in a time of cyber-attacks and security breaches. When regional Victorian hospitals and health services were hit by a ransomware attack in late 2019, it forced a shutdown of critical systems – including patient records and financial management – until the issue could be resolved. It also left users without email or internet access for weeks and required manual workarounds for wage and invoice processing, causing untold disruption and threatening patient privacy.
Service interruptions aside, privacy breaches have serious ongoing effects, as Sydney property valuation and consulting business, LandMark White (LMW) discovered throughout 2019. When 137,500 valuation records were stolen from LMW’s database in January and posted on the dark web, banks and other property sector businesses were forced to inform customers about the breach. LMW was suspended from the Big Four bank panels until adequate cyber security measures were in place. The reputational damage was devastating and LMW lost an estimated $7 million in revenue. A forced three-month trading halt eventually resulted in a declared a full year loss of $2.3m, rather than the $2.8 profit it was expecting.
As the number of cyber-attack instances continues to grow, even tech companies are vulnerable, with online graphic design service Canva experiencing a ‘security incident’ in May 2019 that saw personal details of 139 million customers worldwide accessed.
Unrivalled security
Despite the increasing frequency of this type of attack and the fall-out they induce, we’ve noticed that certain myths persistently prevail among businesses yet to transition to SaaS; that an on-premise environment is somehow more secure than the cloud and that all cloud-hosted offerings are equal.
In truth, most organisations are ill-equipped to deal with increasingly sophisticated cyber-attacks in-house and using a third-party Managed Service Provider (MSP) is no guarantee either. Security considerations are a current concern for many organisations, as support for Windows Server 2008 was officially withdrawn early 2020. Users will now pay for security updates under an annual fee structure which applies to a point no later than 2023. If you’re now considering a major server upgrade – either on-premise or via a third-party MSP – then it’s time to investigate alternatives.
When G&C Mutual Bank decided the time was right for an upgrade, several options were investigated. G&C Chief Information Officer, David Chapman said security was a chief concern.
“An assessment of our previous MSP environment resulted in a lot of red flags. In a world of hackers and cyber security, we needed to make a change and moving to SaaS has erased all of these issues for us,” he said.
We’ve built our offering in partnership with market leader AWS, so you know you’re getting the best security available. As well as maintaining the highest level of security accreditation and certification, we conduct compliance audits and independent intrusion testing on a continual basis. This not only assesses our ability to protect and defend against threats, but also how we dynamically respond when challenged.
Data privacy is built into everything we do. Our solution is delivered from local data centres, via a single tenant database, ensuring your data is secure and compliant with sovereignty requests.
Efficiency gains
The benefits of SaaS go beyond superior security. Committing to an on-premise or MSP cloud-hosted delivery model means it’s hard staying on the latest version of the software – or undertaking a complex, costly and error-prone process to upgrade. As Boards are increasingly being asked to sign off IT security and privacy risk assessments, shifting to a highly accredited SaaS platform will significantly and demonstrably reduce the IT security and privacy risk profile.
Transitioning to the TechnologyOne SaaS platform means enjoying the latest features and functionality, implemented in two major upgrades every year. Each contains hundreds of enhancements designed to streamline processes and optimise the user experience, transforming your business and empowering your team to be more agile and responsive.
SaaS delivers operational efficiencies, as the entire environment is managed by us including automatic upgrades, patch management, compliance obligations and ongoing support. That means less time in-house spent on operational IT support, freeing up resources to be redeployed into other parts of the business.
We’ve built speed into our core functionality, so you’ll save hours of time on end of month reporting in addition to enjoying zero downtime for upgrades.
For Chapman, the benefits are ongoing.
“The implementation has introduced business process automation that wasn’t possible before.
“The benefits we’ve experienced have come a lot faster than we initially thought and are far more effective than we believed they would be. It’s been a win-win all around,” he said.
Moving from on-premise to SaaS will eliminate many of the security, reliability and efficiency challenges currently experienced in your business. If you’d rather focus on your customers than on your technology, it’s time to talk to a member of our SaaS team.
Discover More:
How to keep your documents secure in today’s flexible workplace
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