Why move to a cloud database?

 So as part of looking into cloud databases and infrastructure I wanted to remind myself of the reasons for and against moving to the cloud. 

Benefits of moving to the cloud:

• For the most part you can pay as you go. If you only process data at certain times or only have your BI Tool active during working hours then you can turn off and on as required and save money compared to hosting an on-prem database. 
• No need to worry about hardware and infrastructure. For the most part this will be handled by your service provider. Other than potentially increasing costs you don't have to worry about upgrading your servers all the time and for lack of a better word, leasing this can be much cheaper than buying your own kit all the time. Azure for example offered SSD storage well before it became cost effective on-prem. 
• Major cloud vendors will use virtual private cloud that will ensure you have excellent security and access to your systems. 
• If required you could have your systems hosted in different countries, this is great for having local servers and reduce risk from natural disasters etc. This combined with load balancing should allow for a smooth and fast service for everyone. 
• Cloud services can offer elastic scaling, when you need the resource the systems will naturally increase rather than fall over. No more fixing the ETL on a Monday and running days worth of catch up because of running out of space. Good DBAs would be on top of this anyway. 

These are some of the major benefits of moving to the cloud, it can be cheaper and more secure with less chance of falling over.