Israeli startup Newvem knows cloud analytics. The company's KnowYourCloud Analytics service is a free SaaS-based tool that helps Amazon Web Services users analyze their cloud usage and optimize their cloud spend. According to a constantly-updated crawl on the company's homepage, they have identified over $11 million in potential savings to date.

Newvem is an Amazon Solutions Partner and for the moment is putting all of its focus into the AWS cloud, but hopes to eventually expand to other public cloud platforms, such as Rackspace, Microsoft Azure and HP's OpenStack. Newvem provides additional details about the company in this brief Q&A.

Who is Newvem? What is the company's goal and vision?

Newvem is a cloud analytics company that helps Amazon Web Services (AWS) users get the most out of their cloud. The company's goal is to give IT professionals, CIOs and other cloud users a 360-degree view of their cloud usage and in turn enable them to run a more reliable and efficient cloud. With Newvem's KnowYourCloud Analytics Web application, users can get immediate insight into how their cloud is behaving as it relates to costs, availability, security and utilization, as well as receive recommendations and solutions for how to better manage their cloud more efficiently and effectively.

Newvem's vision is to not only enhance efficiency in the cloud but to also enhance proficiency so that all users have the know-how and insight to make the best cloud business decisions for their company.

CEO Zev Laderman shared that the KnowYourCloud Analytics is like Google Analytics for cloud computing, how so?

Newvem analyzes AWS usage in a very similar way to how Google Analytics analyzes Web traffic. So whereas a website manager relies on Google Analytics to make better decisions on incoming traffic sources, conversions, and exit traffic, Newvem empowers cloud users to make better decisions on cost efficiency, security, availability and utilization with powerful analytics of their AWS cloud.

What about the Reserved Decision Making Tool - how does that fit in?

Reserved Instances is a hidden AWS gem for enterprise users. The difference between AWS's popular On-Demand Instances model and Reserved Instances is that with Reserved Instances, users can benefit from a 35-50 percent cost reduction if they lock into a 1-3 year contract. For heavy users, this is a great way to take consistent On-Demand loads to Reserved Instances and benefit with long-term cost savings. Newvem's Reserved Instances Decision Making Tool, which is part of our KnowYourCloud Analytics web application, helps users make a 'no-regret' decision. The Reserved Instances Decision Making Tool helps users by: 1) Identifying users' consistent usage that would benefit from moving to Reserved Instances; 2) Following up on how efficiently those Reserved Instances are being utilized; and 3) Recommending what users should do once their Reserved Instances are about to expire.

This "analytics engine" - does it happen to be powered by AWS?

Newvem's KnowYourCloud Analytics Web application is independent from AWS. A user simply adds his/her AWS credentials, and Newvem begins analyzing his/her applicable cloud, delivering actionable insights, and offering recommendations.

Are there similar solutions on the market? If so, how do you differentiate yourself?

Newvem is focused on the enterprise. Just as traditional systems management solutions like Oracle, BMC, CA, and IBM solutions enable CIOs and their operations teams to manage their private clouds, Newvem enables CIOs to onboard and improve their AWS cloud usage.

According to your website, the tool is currently available as a free beta. What is your business plan?

At the moment, Newvem is in public beta and collecting information, feedback and use cases to ensure that the company's paid offering is dynamic enough for a variety of users.

Could this tool potential straddle the public/cloud divide, i.e., work in a hybrid cloud scenario?

Yes, most definitely.

Do you consider yourself a big data company?

Yes, but more specifically Newvem is in the big data analysis domain.

What are your thoughts on the future of big data?

The same amount of data that was generated in one year just a few years ago is now being generated in just one day. Newvem believes that this trend will continue and that the importance of moving to the cloud is becoming much more relevant. This is creating a situation where much larger enterprise operations, like Telco, will have to move more and more of their load to the cloud.