Cloud Computing IT Strategy: A Detailed Proposal for Ebix Inc's Growth

This report presents an IT strategy proposal for Ebix Inc, advocating for the implementation of cloud computing to enhance business operations. It begins with an executive summary outlining the recommendation and its financial benefits. The report describes Ebix's business, highlighting opportunities and issues related to its products, customers, competitors, and financial standing. The core of the proposal includes three key initiatives: an open architecture initiative, R&D through open innovation, and XFARM initiatives. A detailed cost-benefit analysis is provided, covering hardware, software, development, and operational costs, alongside projected savings. An implementation timeline is presented, emphasizing a phased approach to allow for analysis and adjustments. The report also outlines a plan for sustaining the IT initiatives, focusing on key performance indicators (KPIs) related to service, customers, cost, and infrastructure. The conclusion summarizes the proposal and its potential impact on Ebix Inc.

Running head: IT Strategy 1
IT Strategy for Ebix Inc.
[Student Name]
[Course and Instructor]

IT Strategy 2
IT Strategy for Ebix Inc.
Ebix Inc. should go for cloud computing as it can provide large number of benefits.
Cloud Computing comes up with large number of benefits like lower costs, better collaboration,
increasing flexibility, and much greater integration. Cloud computing aims to reduce the overall
cost of operation of school by elimination of any kind of purchase of expensive data center
(Botta et al., 2016). Employees come up with unlimited space for storage and saving cost from
any kind of external storage. Cost-effectiveness in case of disaster recovery by cloud computing
can be accelerated for recovery. It can make use of cloud data management which is a mandatory
parameter.
Description of the Business
Ebix. Inc is a small US-based organization which aims to provide software and e-
commerce solution for both finance and healthcare industry. The organization aims to provide
software products for insurance industry like carrier system and exchanges (ebix.com, 2019).
The organization conducts its operation in four of the channels like exchanges, carrier system,
broken system, and last risk compliance based solution. Ebix carries out its data exchange in
various areas like insurance, employee health benefits, risk management, compensation, and
casual insurance. Ebix emphasizes on some of the major areas of broken system like design and
deployed of various back-end system.
IT Strategy Proposal
With the passage of time, there has been increasing demand for cloud service enterprises.
By the help of this proposed strategy, application information and business information to
customers and business partners of Ebix Inc (Hashem et al., 2015). The three initiatives for cloud

IT Strategy 3
computing technology are open architecture initiative, R&D through open innovation, XFARM
initiative.
Open Architecture Initiative
Cloud Foundry can be defined as an open PaaS that aims to provide cloud runtime
environment (Chen et al., 2016). It is mainly inclusive of run-time environment for various
application in both Ruby and Java languages like databases. Open Stack is defined as an IaaS
function of management which controls virtual machines.
XFARM Initiatives
Ebix Inc. can go for in-house cloud for conducting researcher for using and improving
research and development. XFARM can go environment for demonstrating and development of
service by making use of aggregation of technologies like virtualization for sharing its server.
R&D through open innovation
Various technologies in the domain of cloud computing are advancing at a rapid rate. The
overall lifecycle is getting much shorter on day by day and the technologies are becoming very
much complex in nature (Almorsy, Grundy & Müller, 2016). Ebix organization should promote
open innovation so that they can make use of products. It is mainly done so they can open up
new technologies from different parts of the world.
Sourcing Strategy
The implementation in X-FARM initiatives of cloud computing is considered to be in-
house that helps researchers to improve R& D (Ali, Khan & Vasilakos, 2015). XFARM
initiatives aim to provide proper environment which is needed for service development and
aggregation of technologies. By making use of ICT resource components can provide on demand

IT Strategy 4
and build separate and configured virtual networks. It does not improve the efficiency of the
given R&D activities but also helps in solving large number of problems (Chen, 2015). Ryu is a
platform based software which aims to implement software-defined networks for managing
operation of network devices through software. It can easily provide various kind of function like
control of network path and monitoring of traffic.
Financial Case
The overall cost of cloud computing tends to depend on the service required by
organization. Cloud computing aims to provide huge number of benefits like flexibility,
efficiency, and strategic value. Cloud computing technology saves the involved cost of server
and other associated equipment’s (Celli et al., 2018). There is some free cloud service like cloud
storage and file–sharing like Dropbox which is free to users. Some of the advanced features
come up with cost of 20 dollars per month for user. Some of the cloud service providers like
carbonite cost around 60 dollars. Amazon Web Services aims to offer wide range of cloud
services like data centers for free or even pay on go basis. Cloud-based software aims to offer
pricing which totally depends on provider and industry (Chen et al., 2016). The pricing of SaaS
will the organization to launch and distribute various kind of software across the organization
(Ebix Inc.). Table 1 and 2 helps in understanding the overall cost of implementing cloud
computing in Ebix Inc.

Running head: IT Strategy 5
Table 1:
Cost of
Implementing Cloud Computing Technology in Ebix
(Source: Created by Author)
Cost of implementing Cloud Computing Technology in Ebix
Hardware $ 20,000.00
Software $ 5,000.00
Development team salaries $ 20,000.00
Training $ 5,000.00
Total Development Cost $ 50,000.00
Hardware $ 20,000.00
Software $ 20,000.00
Operational Labor $ 5,000.00
Total Operational Cost $ 45,000.00
Approximate salary savings $ 10,000.00
Reduced operating cost $ 49,000.00
Total Benefit $ 59,000.00
Discount Rate Used 5.00%

IT Strategy 6
Project Cost-
Benefit
Analysis
Analysis
Variables:
Discount
Rate Used 5.00%
Annual
Benefits
$
59,000.
00
Annual
Operational
Costs
$
45,000.
00
One-Time
Development
Cost
$
50,000.
00
Year of
Project
0 1 2 3 4 5
TOTAL
S
Economic
Benefit $0.00
$
59,000.
00
$
59,000.
00
$
59,000.0
0
$
59,000.0
0
$
59,000.0
0
Discount Rate 1.0000 0.9524 0.9070 0.8638 0.8227 0.7835
PV of Benefits $0.00
$56,190
.48
$53,514
.74
$50,966.
42
$48,539.
45
$46,228.
04
NPV of all
BENEFITS $0.00
$
56,190.
48
$
109,705
.22
$
160,671.
63
$
209,211.
08
$
255,439.
12
$
255,439.
12
One-Time
COSTS
$
(50,000.
00)
Recurring
Costs $0.00
$
(45,000.
00)
$
(45,000.
00)
$
(45,000.
00)
$
(45,000.
00)
$
(45,000.
00)
Discount Rate 1.0000 0.9524 0.9070 0.8638 0.8227 0.7835
PV of
Recurring
Costs $0.00
$
(42,857.
14)
$
(40,816.
33)
$
(38,872.
69)
$
(37,021.
61)
$
(35,258.
68)
NPV of all
COSTS
$
(50,000.
00)
$
(92,857.
14)
$
(133,67
3.47)
$
(172,546
.16)
$
(209,567
.77)
$
(244,826
.45)
$
(244,826
.45)
Overall NPV
$
10,612.6
7
Overall ROI

IT Strategy 7
0.0433
Table 2: Cost-Benefit Analysis
(Source: Created By Author)

Running head: IT Strategy 8
Implementation Timeline
All three initiative of cloud computing technology will not be implemented at once. The
three initiative will be implemented one by one in Ebix Inc (Almorsy, Grundy & Müller, 2016).
After the implementation of one initiative in Ebix Inc, the organization will practically analyze
its benefits or issues. If the initiative comes up with issues, then Ebix will go for second
initiative. There will be a time gap between the implementation of initiative for analyzing various
issues.

IT Strategy 9
Fig 1: Schedule for Implementation of Cloud Computing in Ebix Inc.
(Source: Created by Author)

IT Strategy 10
Plan for Sustaining the IT Initiatives
Organization like Ebix Inc. can easily make a choice of KPI based on the needs of the
user. Both operational and business data are needed by user for improving. Initial KPI is required
for establishing a proper kind of behavior or baseline of the given performance (Ali, Khan &
Vasilakos, 2015). An individual can keep a track of KPI by making use of data and holding the
providers. There are mainly four types of KPI in cloud like
Service KPI: Irrespective of cloud type, organization like Ebix can easily start with KPI
for integrity and availability of cloud services (Celli et al., 2018). There is various kind of KPI
which are required keeping a track of cloud availability and solution to problem.
Customer KPI: If the user is not satisfied with the given cloud service, then they can
look some alternative available option.
Cost KPI: Organization can implement cloud KPI based on the costs (Chen, 2015). In
cloud, computing variability can easily result in unpredictable cost along with unexpected cost.
Infrastructure KPI: Infrastructure cloud KPI are totally based on private cloud which
includes some operational details of various server and data centers.
Summary
From the above pages, the fact can be concluded that the report is all about proposal of IT
Strategy proposal in Ebix Inc. A list of financial benefits has been discussed in brief. After that,
the current opportunities and issues in business have been described in details. Three initiatives
for IT strategy has been discussed. A cost-benefit analysis has been provided for both hardware
and software for implementation of cloud computing. The timeline of implementation of cloud
computing in Ebix has been explained with list of reasons.

IT Strategy 11
References
Ali, M., Khan, S. U., & Vasilakos, A. V. (2015). Security in cloud computing: Opportunities and
challenges. Information sciences, 305, 357-383.
Almorsy, M., Grundy, J., & Müller, I. (2016). An analysis of the cloud computing security
problem. arXiv preprint arXiv:1609.01107.
Botta, A., De Donato, W., Persico, V., & Pescapé, A. (2016). Integration of cloud computing and
internet of things: a survey. Future generation computer systems, 56, 684-700.
Celli, G., Pilo, F., Pisano, G., & Soma, G. G. (2018, May). Including voltage dips mitigation in
cost-benefit analysis of storages. In 2018 18th International Conference on Harmonics
and Quality of Power (ICHQP) (pp. 1-6). IEEE.
Chen, X. (2015). Decentralized computation offloading game for mobile cloud computing. IEEE
Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems, 26(4), 974-983.
Chen, X., Jiao, L., Li, W., & Fu, X. (2016). Efficient multi-user computation offloading for
mobile-edge cloud computing. IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking, 24(5), 2795-
2808.
ebix.com. (2019). Insurance Software Solution | Insurance Software Development -Ebix. [online]
Available at: https://www.ebix.com/ [Accessed 3 Mar. 2019].

IT Strategy 12
Hashem, I. A. T., Yaqoob, I., Anuar, N. B., Mokhtar, S., Gani, A., & Khan, S. U. (2015). The rise
of “big data” on cloud computing: Review and open research issues. Information
systems, 47, 98-115.