Atea Public Cloud Operations · Microsoft Azure

One integrated
operating model,
not a menu.

Four interdependent capabilities, two governance perimeters, and consumption-based pricing that scales with the customer's Azure environment — hybrid included.

4
Interdependent capabilities
2
Governance perimeters
1
Team, start to steady state
TENANT GOVERNANCE PERIMETER MOS SLA-backed operations visibility-only governance ops-scope: in ops-scope: out

What is MPC

A structural redefinition, not an update

Managed Public Cloud moves from modular managed-operations to a single, integrated cloud operating model. Sell it as one defined service, not a menu.

Non-separability — the defining constraint

The four capabilities are not individually selectable, excludable, or priced separately. Every engagement includes all four. A customer asking for "just CloudOps" is asking for a service that does not exist in this catalogue.

Dimension Previous model Managed Public Cloud
Architecture Capabilities loosely defined and individually selectable Four interdependent capabilities, always delivered together; DevOps is now a formal core capability
Governance Scope set per deal; governance limited to the managed estate TGP across the whole tenant; MOS for the SLA-backed estate
Commercial Fixed fee plus a separate tenant governance charge Consumption-based: Operational Fee with TGP bundled, flat 5% out-of-scope fee, per-node Arc fees
Security Scope misunderstood; customers expected detection & response SecOps is the posture baseline only; detection & response are delivered through SOC+
Hybrid Azure-focused; on-prem treated as an edge case Hybrid is a core use case via Azure Arc, operated on parity with Azure-native resources

02 — Capability stack

The four capabilities

CloudOps is the operational foundation; SecOps, FinOps, and DevOps build on top of it. Select a capability below.

Cloud Operations

The operational management of the customer's Azure platform — the foundation every other capability builds on. Tooling: Azure Monitor, Log Analytics, Update Manager, Azure Backup, Azure Policy, ServiceNow.

  • Continuous monitoring and observability of platform and operational health
  • Incident detection, triage, and resolution against SLA across all managed services
  • Change and request management on the ITIL framework, anchored by the Standard Change Register
  • Patch management, backup and recovery, resource lifecycle support within MOS
  • Tenant and subscription governance; RBAC posture assessment and target-state advisory
  • Operation of Arc-enabled on-premises resources within MOS on parity with Azure-native resources
Scope boundary. CloudOps operates resources Atea has access to and that sit within MOS. Out-of-scope subscriptions receive TGP visibility only. Underlying on-premises infrastructure (hypervisor, storage, network, site) remains the customer's responsibility.

Security Operations

The security baseline discipline — built entirely on Microsoft Defender for Cloud. It establishes and continuously maintains the security posture against which the environment is measured. It is not a Security Operations Centre.

  • Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) and Secure Score governance
  • Misconfiguration detection and remediation surfacing; hardening against MCSB
  • Identity hygiene: privileged access review, Conditional Access review, service-principal hygiene
  • Policy and compliance posture mapping against MCSB, NIS2, ISO 27001, CIS, DORA-relevant controls
  • Reporting is observational — certification remains the customer's responsibility
The SOC question — read before every security conversation. SecOps surfaces posture findings; it does not triage them. Threat detection, SIEM analytics, alert triage, automated containment, and incident response are delivered through the separate SOC+ service. Set this boundary before showing the capability list, not after.

Financial Operations

Cost governance and financial control built on Azure Cost Management and Azure Advisor. A governance and advisory function: understand what is spent, where, and whether it is within agreed boundaries.

  • Cost visibility and monthly cost reporting across the full tenant
  • Subscription budgets, spending alerts, and anomaly response within MOS
  • Tagging governance enforced via Azure Policy within MOS; out-of-scope gaps surfaced as unallocated cost lines
  • Azure Advisor cost advisory plus execution of low-risk, in-catalogue optimisation changes
  • Commitment planning advisory (Reserved Instances, Savings Plans); showback/chargeback on T&M
Scope boundary. FinOps does not deliver a structured optimisation programme. Right-sizing analysis, workload rearchitecting, or reservation-portfolio management are referred to Atea Cloud Economics (Professional Services).

Development Operations

A platform-team role for the customer's development organisation, delivered by the same engineers as CloudOps. The most maturity-sensitive capability — scope and intensity scale with the customer's cloud maturity level.

  • IaC governance framework, blessed module catalogue, and drift detection
  • Pipeline observability for operational impact (not application-level pipeline management)
  • Release coordination and post-deployment validation for infrastructure and platform changes
  • Active sparring-partner engagement with development teams on platform architecture and tooling
Shared responsibility. Atea's DevOps scope covers the platform layer. Application code ownership, deployment decisions, and release-approval authority stay with the customer at every maturity level. Maturity is assessed, not negotiated — it cannot be purchased.

03 — Governance architecture

The two-perimeter scope model

Every billing, SLA, and contractual obligation flows from a single automated boundary: a subscription-level tag.

Tenant Governance Perimeter

TGP — whole tenant, always

Covers every subscription in the Azure tenant via management-group hierarchy. Governance controls inherit downward. Non-negotiable, cannot be partially applied. For out-of-scope subscriptions: visibility-only — policy compliance and posture reporting, no active management.

Managed Operational Scope

MOS — the SLA-backed estate

Defined by subscription-level ops-scope: in tags applied at onboarding. Incident response, change execution, and all SLA obligations apply only within MOS. The Operational Fee is calculated against in-scope consumption only. A TGP-only engagement without at least one in-scope subscription is not available.

Tag Meaning & consequence
ops-scope: in Within MOS. Full managed operations, SLA commitments, and TGP governance bundled into the Operational Fee. No separate governance charge.
ops-scope: out Excluded from MOS. Out-of-Scope Governance Fee of 5% applies to that subscription's consumption. SLA obligations released; customer accepts full operational responsibility. Lighthouse delegations and operational runbooks are not extended.

04 — Consumption-based pricing

Commercial model

Two components for cloud-only customers, three for hybrid. Fee scales with the environment so effort and revenue move together.

Component Applied to Indicative rate
Operational Fee — Azure In-scope subscriptions (MOS) — TGP governance bundled 18–25%
Out-of-Scope Governance Fee Out-of-scope subscriptions only 5% flat
Operational Fee — Arc (hybrid) Arc-enabled nodes within MOS, by node type NOK 800–4,200/node/mo

Arc node fee structure

Node type Rate Indicative NOK/mo Key overhead
Arc-enabled server (Windows / Linux) 1.0× 800–1,200 Baseline; ESU lifecycle where applicable
Arc-enabled SQL Server 2.0× 1,600–2,400 SQL monitoring, Defender for SQL, ESU compliance
Arc-enabled Kubernetes cluster 3.5× 2,800–4,200 Escalate to Cloud Sales Specialist + PM before quoting
Arc-projected VMware / SCVMM VM 1.2× 960–1,440 Per projected VM; minimum 5 per resource bridge

Pricing trainer

Monthly fee estimator
INDICATIVE · TRAINING ONLY
20%
30%
Arc nodes (leave zero for cloud-only)
Operational Fee — Azure20% × 250,000
Out-of-Scope Governance5% × 100,000
Arc Node Feeby node type
Total monthly
Est. cost (excl. margin)at 30% margin
Est. gross margin30% of total
Kubernetes in scope — engage Cloud Sales Specialist and Product Manager before finalising price.

Standalone minimum: NOK 200,000/mo in-scope, or 10 Arc nodes for hybrid-only. No minimums inside a sourcing deal. Rates indicative pending internal cost model.

Defending the percentage model

The framing: "This is the same principle as assets under management. We are managing your cloud estate — the fee reflects the scale of what we are responsible for." Larger environments have more resources, higher alert volume, a greater compliance surface, and a larger blast radius on incidents. A fixed fee either overcharges small customers or underresources Atea on large ones. Do not offer a fee cap or flat conversion — both break the model.

05 — Access & tooling

Technical foundation

A least-privilege, fully audited access stack. The same tooling for cloud-native and Arc-projected resources.

Azure Lighthouse

Cross-tenant resource management from Atea's operational tenant — no guest accounts, no standing access. Delegations scoped strictly to MOS subscriptions.

GDAP

Granular Delegated Admin Privileges for Entra ID management, scoped to directory roles required for operations only. Does not extend to M365 unless explicitly agreed.

PIM / JIT

Privileged Identity Management enforces just-in-time, time-bounded, justified, and fully audited access elevation. No standing privileged access held by engineers.

Break Glass

Emergency access account secured by two FIDO devices in two separate secured locations. Established during onboarding. Ownership and recovery process confirmed before contract signature.

Azure Arc

Projects on-prem servers, SQL, Kubernetes, and VMware/SCVMM VMs into Azure as first-class resources, operated within MOS via the same ops-scope tag.

ServiceNow & Cloud Reports

ServiceNow is the ITSM platform for incident, change, and request management. Atea Cloud Reports provides the customer-facing reporting surface.

Licensing gates capability depth

Entra ID P1/P2 is required for full Conditional Access and PIM; Defender workload plans gate SecOps posture depth. Where prerequisites are absent, deliverable scope is limited proportionally. Document all gaps at onboarding — gaps are classified, not used to refuse the engagement.

06 — How the engagement runs

Operating model

ITIL-aligned delivery. One cross-capability governance forum. The same team from discovery to steady state.

From contract signature to steady state

  1. 1
    DiscoveryStructured assessment of the full tenant — architecture, subscriptions, management groups, identity, and operational requirements. Conducted by the same engineers who will run steady state.
  2. 2
    Gap classificationEach identified gap is resolved before go-live, scheduled as a CSI backlog item, or formally accepted as a known risk in writing. Atea will not refuse to operate an environment solely on the basis of gaps.
  3. 3
    OnboardingGovernance baseline, Lighthouse + GDAP, Defender for Cloud, Cost Management, Update Manager, backup, ITSM integration, DevOps maturity assessment. Method: Day-0 Operations or Operational Handover Project.
  4. 4
    Steady-state operationsThe same engineers operate the environment under SLA. ITIL incident, change, and request processes; Standard Change Register as the execution authority for pre-approved changes.
  5. 5
    Monthly Operational ReviewWithin the first ten business days of each month. One cross-capability forum: operations, security posture, cost, and platform state. Structured around exceptions, decisions, and forward planning.

Cloud maturity — DevOps engagement scales with it

LEVEL 1
Traditional IT

VM workloads, limited IaC, manual deployment. DevOps is largely advisory; maturity assessment sets a credible target state.

LEVEL 2
Cloud-Enabled

Mixed VM/PaaS, some Terraform/Bicep. Active IaC governance, drift detection, module compliance review.

LEVEL 3
Cloud-Native

Containers, serverless, CI/CD as primary deployment path. Blessed-module management, release coordination, sparring partner engagement.

LEVEL 4
DevOps / SRE

SLOs/SLIs, GitOps, policy-as-code. Full platform-team engagement; Atea as integrated technical peer.

Maturity is assessed, not negotiated. A Traditional IT customer cannot purchase SRE-level engagement.

07 — Go-to-market

Selling MPC

Anchor positioning on one integrated service, set the security boundary before showing the capability list, and qualify hard against the disqualifiers.

Positioning framings

From managed Azure operations to an end-to-end cloud operating model.

From optional, fragmented capabilities to one integrated four-capability platform.

From partial control to full tenant governance with defined operational responsibility (TGP & MOS).

From a blurred security boundary to a clear SecOps baseline, with SOC+ as the detection & response layer.

Prerequisites to confirm in the sales phase

Prerequisite Why it matters & how to handle
CSP agreement with Atea Required for Atea to escalate Azure platform issues to Microsoft. EA is supported but degrades support quality — propose CSP transition as part of the deal.
Break Glass — 2 FIDO devices Two devices in two separate secured locations. Confirm who holds the devices, safe locations, and recovery process before contract signature.
Azure Lighthouse + GDAP The access model, not an option. Established at onboarding; the customer must agree to grant it.
Microsoft licensing Entra ID P1/P2 for Conditional Access and PIM; Defender plans per workload for full SecOps depth. Document gaps at onboarding.
Extended Atea security services Required for 24×7 response to Critical/High security incidents. Without it, out-of-hours response cannot be guaranteed — confirm or establish before go-live.
Hybrid connectivity ExpressRoute/VPN and Arc-agent connectivity for hybrid customers. Connectivity and its cost are the customer's responsibility.

Scope exclusions — the no-go list

If it's not in the Master Service Description, it's not delivered

MPC does not include: application development, DBA beyond platform, a SOC or detection & response, structured cost-optimisation programmes, or Annual Service Reviews. Anything beyond standard scope must be documented as a deviation and approved by the Service Governance Team.

Sales-to-onboarding checklist

  • In-scope Azure spend confirmed against threshold (or sourcing context documented)
  • Hybrid: Arc node count and node-type mix confirmed; resource-bridge topology documented
  • Governance acceptance, access model, and supported platforms verified
  • Tenant inventory, subscription map, and identity model captured
  • MOS classification: every subscription tagged in/out with rationale
  • Maturity level assessed; DevOps scope reflects the outcome
  • All prerequisites confirmed: CSP, Break Glass, GDAP, Lighthouse, licensing, security contact
  • Value-adding services reviewed: SOC+, Cloud Economics, Managed Database, Managed Backup, Managed Network, IRT, CloudTrack
  • Three-component pricing calculated in Pricing Tool/SPDI; margin reviewed
  • Onboarding method chosen; estimate requested via OneHub
  • Full contract pack attached: MSD, four Capability Descriptions, SLA, Pricing Model, Identity Policy, Data Protection Annex
  • OneHub order submitted with signed contract and complete customer contacts

08 — Sales tool

Proposal builder

Build a customer-ready proposal summary from your deal inputs. Complete each tab, then export to text or copy to clipboard.

Add each subscription and classify it as in-scope (MOS) or out-of-scope. This drives the fee calculation and the proposal scope narrative.

ARC NODES (hybrid — leave zero if cloud-only)

Select value-adding services to include in the proposal. Each will appear in the proposal narrative.

09 — Service levels

SLA reference

Service SLAs measured at 90% attainment. Applies across all four capabilities.

Priority Description Response Resolution Schedule
P1 Critical — service down, business impact immediate 30 min 4 h N5 + A7 (24×7)
P2 High — major function impaired, workaround limited 1 h 8 h N5 + A7 (24×7)
P3 Medium — degraded function, workaround available 4 h 24 h N5
P4 Low — minor, no immediate operational impact 1 day 40 h N5
P5 Minimal — informational, no impact 1 day Best effort N5

A7 (around-the-clock) coverage on P1/P2 depends on the Extended Atea security services arrangement. Customer-identified P1/P2 incidents must be raised through the service portal for SLAs to trigger.

Worked example — cloud-only

In-scope: 250,000 × 20% = 50,000
Out-of-scope: 100,000 × 5% = 5,000
Total: NOK 55,000/mo

Worked example — hybrid

+ 30 servers + 8 SQL + 20 VMs
Arc fee: 70,000
Total: NOK 125,000/mo

Standalone minimums

NOK 200,000/mo in-scope consumption, or 10 Arc nodes (hybrid). No minimums apply within a sourcing agreement.

10 — Terminology

Glossary

The exact terms used across the document suite. Precision matters in contract and delivery conversations.

TGP — Tenant Governance Perimeter
Governance controls applied across the entire Azure tenant via management-group hierarchy; visibility-only for out-of-scope subscriptions. Non-negotiable.
MOS — Managed Operational Scope
The SLA-backed subscriptions Atea actively operates, defined by the ops-scope: in tag. SLA, incident response, and the Operational Fee are all scoped to MOS.
ops-scope: in / out
The subscription- and Arc-resource-level tag that determines active management, SLA coverage, and which fee component applies.
CSPM
Cloud Security Posture Management — the Defender for Cloud foundation of the SecOps capability.
SOC+
The separate Atea service delivering threat detection, SIEM analytics, alert triage, automated containment, and incident response. Outside core MPC.
GDAP
Granular Delegated Admin Privileges — scoped Entra ID management access used as Atea's directory access model.
PIM / JIT
Privileged Identity Management with just-in-time elevation — time-bounded, justified, and fully audited. No standing privileged access.
Azure Lighthouse
Cross-tenant resource management from Atea's operational tenant — no guest accounts or standing access in the customer's directory.
Azure Arc
Projects on-prem and multi-cloud resources into Azure as first-class Azure resources for management within MOS.
ESU
Extended Security Updates — the customer's commercial obligation. Atea delivers compliance reporting and patch deployment; does not procure ESU licences.
CSI
Continual Service Improvement — the structured backlog of environment gaps scheduled for resolution post-onboarding.
Non-separability
The design constraint that all four capabilities are always delivered together. Individual capabilities cannot be selected, excluded, or priced separately.
Leverage break
The structural effect at the NOK 200,000 in-scope threshold — above it, ~30% reduction in marginal effort makes percentage-based pricing commercially defensible at scale.