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Tech glossary

Defining IT & technology terms

Platform as a Service (PaaS)

Platform as a Service (PaaS) is a cloud service model that provides a complete platform to develop, run and manage applications. PaaS includes both infrastructure — network, storage and compute — and middleware — development tools, operating system and database.

PaaS allows IT teams to focus on developing and managing products without having to create and manage the underlying infrastructure. When leveraging platform as a service, organizations only pay for the infrastructure they use and don’t need to invest in on-premises technology to support their projects.

What are the benefits of PaaS?

Platform as a service can help businesses reduce coding time and increase coding capabilities, which allows teams to launch new applications quicker. It reduces costs and complexity throughout the entire application development lifecycle, from initial build processes to post-deployment management and updates.

Important PaaS considerations

Before you enter into a partnership with a platform as a service vendor, there are key questions to consider, including:

  • Does this offering meet our current needs as well as our goals for the future?
  • Is the level of support provided by the vendor appropriate for the cost to our organization?
  • Will this PaaS solution integrate well with our existing systems?
  • Can this solution scale as our application development practices grow or change?
  • Do the vendor’s data security practices meet our compliance requirements?

Learn more about PaaS

Related terms

  • Cloud enablement
  • Cloud + Data Center Transformation
  • Infrastructure as Code (IaC)
  • Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
  • Software as a Service (SaaS)

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