They say that the biggest success stories stem from a real need. And Simloud is no exception. The Israeli startup brings a revolutionary and holistic automation-based solution to cloud infrastructure, from the code repository to the customer’s modern cloud environment, while eliminating the chaos involved in development and ongoing maintenance.
The good news is the use of a SaaS platform that is accessible through a smart wizard slashes the amount of time and costs involved in onboarding and maintenance in the cloud environment by 75%.
Simloud is now celebrating its second anniversary, and this is a great reason to meet its management team – Assaf Weissblat (CEO & founder), Noam Teltch (Executive Director & founder), and Assaf Koren (CBO & founder) in an interview that will disperse the cloud cover.
How did the concept behind the revolutionary startup emerge?
The concept was born out of the pain and very real difficulties we experienced in the work we did in cloud infrastructures. Assaf Weissblat, said, “As a cloud architect, I was incredibly frustrated. The solutions on the market were limited.
At one point, when I saw that there was no solution that enabled development of a cloud infrastructure in less than 8 months, I came to the conclusion that there had to be a better way.”
Assaf Koren experienced this problem at the VP of Perion Networks, “I faced a huge problem when we needed to move the company’s work environment into the cloud. I said to myself – it just doesn’t make sense. It was a lengthy, expensive and painful process.”
What Challenges Did You Face?
Assaf Koren: “The truth is that we set a goal, which at the beginning, seemed impossible: to transform work processes in a cloud environment that require expensive, lengthy and complex outsourcing services into an automatic, holistic, innovative and integrative solution, based on in-depth understanding of the technology under the hood.
What’s The Secret? How Did You Do It?
Assaf Weissblat: “We’ll start with a combination of an in-depth understanding of the needs and desires of SMBs and enterprises, and solutions developed for cloud architecture. The encounter between a need and solution led to outstanding results. Getting customers deployed on the cloud quickly, at a far lower cost, while providing a holistic solution that saves months of work and tens of thousands of dollars, and address the need for ongoing maintenance, updates, and version management.
Assaf Koren: “Obviously, this process included learning and upgrading existing solutions that only provided a partial and insufficient response, including among other things, by a company that was acquired by Salesforce, we were able to create automatic specification of the customer’s needs based on decades of experience (of the Simloud team) and a far-reaching vision of providing in-depth solutions to a variety of companies.
So, What Is the Message You Bring to The Table?
Assaf Weissblat: The SaaS platform we developed delivers something new and powerful advantages, both during migration and when performing regular maintenance. When migrating to the cloud, the system specifies needs through a short, 20-minute configuration process, making it possible to onboard in the cloud environment at an unprecedented speed. In fact, this is a unique platform that makes the complex cloud environment accessible to those who are not experts and also enables experts to leverage their knowledge into the system.
When dealing with regular maintenance, the unique advantages include:
- Complete and simple control of the entire cloud infrastructure through a single system.
- An open-source platform that allows all DevOps to continue to perform maintenance simply and easily.
- A revolutionary innovation that allows noncritical work environments to be shut down, as required, leading to significant cost savings.
- Automatic version updates that enable ongoing work.
- Fixed monthly payment that is known in advance, with no surprises.
- Comprehensive and ongoing guidance and support for the customer, through a customer-centric approach.
So, How Were You Able to Cut Onboarding Time?
It is important to note that we implement a radical automated approach. We developed a process that is based on identification of recurrent patterns in cloud architectures and how they are used by customers, using the industry’s best practices, that combine automation of open-source DevOps tools, with emphasis on integration and simplicity of use.
And Who Is Your Ideal Target Audience?
Our ideal target audience is made up of companies that want to move to a modern cloud infrastructure, while using advanced technologies such as Dockers, Kubernetes and Serverless. Additionally, companies that are already on the cloud and want to dramatically improve their use of the cloud while lowering costs, improving advanced capabilities at the security level and upgrading their technology level – from virtual machines to advanced microservices infrastructure.
What Cloud Service Provider Do You Currently Work With?
Simloud’s platform supports Amazon Web Services (AWS) and will soon also be adapted to work with additional cloud infrastructures such as Microsoft’s.
Do You Have Patents?
Yes, some of our innovations were submitted to be registered as patents and they deliver up to 75% savings of time and costs.
How Do Your Customers Respond to The User Experience with The Simloud Wizard?
The dozens of customers that have already joined the revolution we started talk about the dramatic change in work times and cost savings. A recent example is Smart Berry, which created a new social platform to promote discussion of healthy sexuality. We onboarded Smart Berry using the Simloud platform in a very short time frame, while creating a cloud infrastructure and holistic solution that enables CI/CD processes, use of a vault and centralized monitoring and logging, which led to significant savings in cloud costs.
And, indeed, in a phone call, Smart Berry’s CEO, Yonathan Livne, said, “Our cloud architecture soared at an incredible speed, making maximum use of the abilities of the cloud infrastructure and optimizing costs.” Another example is Scopio Labs, which provides digital microscopy services. Ofer Schwartz, Development Team Leader said, “Beyond the fact that the Simloud team understood our exact needs, we felt that we received ongoing guidance and support, and that there was a true desire to hear our requests and feedback.”
What Are Your Plans for The Future?
Our company currently has 19 employees, however in view of the strong demand for Simloud services, we are hiring additional employees and are now experiencing accelerated growth. We recently began partnering with Sarona 365x and AWS and started working with several leading enterprise companies, so it appears that the sky – and the clouds – are the limit.