Azure Cost Anomaly Detection suite

What is it all about?

In the evolving landscape of cloud computing, efficient cost management remains a cornerstone of business success. GDC Services introduces its Azure Cost Anomaly Detection suite - a bespoke FinOps solution designed to detect cost anomalies as early as the day after they occur.

This early detection prevents unnecessary overspend and empowers businesses to continuously refine their cloud cost strategies. By leveraging actionable insights, the solution ensures long term savings and boosts operational efficiency.

Cost Anomaly - It’s not just about the size of the overpayment, it’s about how long it goes unnoticed!

$10 * 30 days * 12 months = $3600

Key Benefits

Below we highlight the GDC Services solution’s unique benefits compared with Azure’s native capabilities:

Early Detection:

• GDC Services Solution: Identifies anomalies within 24 hours, enabling faster responses to potential cost issues.
• Azure Native: Identifies anomalies within a minimum of 96 hours, increasing the risk of missed anomalies and overspending.

High Customizability and Flexibility:

• GDC Services Solution: Tailored to fit unique business needs with a custom built algorithm that flags anomalies specific to the organization. Supports intricate detection methods across multiple diverse scenarios.
• Azure Native: More limited flexibility and customization, making it less effective for large or complex environments.

Enhanced Cost Control and Budget Adherence:

• GDC Services Solution: Fully automated to detect inefficiencies, helping businesses maintain strict budgetary constraints and optimize resource usage.
• Azure Native: Basic cost control features with less configurability, often requiring manual oversight to manage budgets across multiple subscriptions.

Faster Mitigation of Unjustified Costs:

• GDC Services Solution: Rapidly flags high cost services like Azure Data Factory (ADF), preventing extended periods of overspending.
• Azure Native: Slower detection and pre-configured settings increase the risk of prolonged inefficiencies.

Real-Life Success Story at a Global Manufacturing Company

Challenge
The primary goal was to detect anomalies, even those caused by minor price fluctuations, while minimizing false positive alerts for the entire Azure Tenant, encompassing over 100 subscriptions. At the same time, specific resource groups must be excluded from monitoring.

Solution

• A custom algorithm was designed to identify even minor usage spikes while effectively avoiding false positives.
• A 30-day trend graph was integrated into cost anomaly alerts to provide actionable insights.
• Activity logs were included in the reports to help pinpoint the root causes of anomalies.
• A "5-day no-repeat" anomaly logic was implemented to prevent duplicate alerts during algorithm reassessments.

Results
The optimized algorithm resulted in significant long-term savings driven by near-immediate response to anomaly detection.  As an illustration, right after algorithm deployment our customer saved over $15K in just two days, by promptly identifying unjustified and misconfigured Azure Data Factory pipeline runs, preventing significant accumulated costs.

Moving Forward

Depending on your internal IT organization, GDC Services is ready to proceed with solution implementation smoothly converted to managed service ensuring timely response to detected anomalies by our Cloud team (right flow); or solution implementation followed by operational handover to internal IT (left flow).

Implementation time typically ranges from 2 to 4 weeks, depending on the complexity of the environment, specific customizations, and the customer's participation in meeting initial requirements.