Exclusive: How Automat-it Helped Hush Security Save $45,000 in Annual Cloud Costs

0:00This audio is presented by Hacker Noon, where anyone can learn anything about any technology. Exclusive. How automatic it helped hush security save $45,000 in annual cloud costs by John Stoy and journalist. Cloud infrastructure has become essential for modern startups, particularly those building-add-driven platforms that rely on scalable, always on environments. But rapid growth can bring a hidden challenge, rising cloud costs that outpace architectural efficiency. As companies scale quickly, unused resources, outdated configurations, and limited visibility into spending can quietly drive up operational expenses. That was the situation facing hush security, an AI identity platform focused on protecting agentic AI and non-human identities. As the company expanded its production environment to support growing demand, its cloud costs began climbing faster than expected. To regain control and improve efficiency, hush security partnered with Automated, an AWS premiered partner and managed services provider

1:01that helps startups harness the full potential of the cloud. The result was a more optimized infrastructure and approximately $45,000 in annual savings. When startup growth outpaces cloud efficiency, hush security's platform tackles a growing challenge in modern cyber security, managing machine identities and automated systems. Instead of relying on static credentials, the company's technology introduces identity-based access controls that help organizations detect exploited credentials and provision just in time permissions across infrastructure environments. As adoption of the platform increased, hush security's cloud infrastructure expanded rapidly. But like many startups scaling their technology, the company began experiencing what could be described as a startup scaling dilemma in which operational growth outpaced cost management practices. Several issues contributed to the rising overhead, limited financial visibility. With multiple workloads running across Amazon Web Services, AWS, it became difficult to clearly track

2:02where spending was occurring in which resources were actually necessary. Architectural inefficiencies, idle infrastructure components continued generating recurring costs despite no longer serving operational needs. Infrastructure lifecycle management. Without timely upgrades to services such as Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service, EKS, organizations risk running outdated versions that can lead to higher support costs or operational bottlenecks. A FinOps led optimization strategy. To address these challenges, Automat it conducted a comprehensive FinOps audit of hush security's cloud environment, combining financial accountability with engineering practices to align spending with business value. The team refined the network architecture by optimizing nag gateway usage Andre routing traffic through private endpoints and public IPs, reducing networking costs without affecting performance. Storage efficiency was improved by adjusting Amazon S3 retention policies while idle resources, including 15 unused VPC endpoints and 9 unattached elastic IPs, were removed.

3:05Additionally, a proactive upgrade of Amazon EKS clusters insured infrastructure remained supported, secure, and cost-efficient, and enrollment in Automat its US reselling program provided immediate discounts and better payment terms. Measurable savings and infrastructure improvements, the impact of Automat its optimization was immediate and substantial. Hush security achieved approximately $45,000 in annual AWS savings through a combination of architectural refinements, storage optimization, and resource clean UP. One of the most striking improvements came in Amazon S3 costs. A key storage bucket that previously ran around $600 per month was reduced to roughly $150 per month, a 75% reduction. Removing idle VPC endpoints and unattached elastic IPs further cut unnecessary recurring expenses, while the EKS upgrade reduced technical debt and improved overall system stability. According to Elon Horowitz, co-founder and VP of R&D at hush security,

4:05the partnership was pivotal in managing growth efficiently. Automat its FinOps support helped us eliminate wasted spend and modernize our infrastructure. Their approach to management and cost optimization has been instrumental in helping us scale efficiently. Beyond immediate financial gains, the infrastructure improvements strengthened hush security's security posture and operational resilience. With a leaner, more efficient cloud environment, the company is now better positioned for future growth and closer to achieving procurement ready status on the AWS marketplace, streamlining enterprise sales opportunities. Turning FinOps into a growth advantage, for fast growing startups, cloud infrastructure often evolves quickly during early scaling phases. Over time, however, that rapid expansion can introduce inefficiencies that quietly inflate costs. In hush security's case, the collaboration with Automat it shows how targeted optimization can deliver both immediate savings and long-term operational improvements. By refining architecture,

5:05removing unused resources, and proactively managing infrastructure life cycles, the company not only reduced expenses but also built a stronger foundation for continued growth. As more organizations adopt cloud-native platforms, cost-aware infrastructure management is becoming less of an operational detail and more of a strategic advantage. This story was distributed as a release by John Stoyen under Hackernoun Business Blogging Program. Thank you for listening to this Hackernoun story, read by Artificial Intelligence. Visit Hackernoun.com to read, write, learn and publish.