Moving from on-premises servers to AWS changes IT spending primarily from capital expenditure (CapEx) to what model?
A.Fixed annual licensing
Fixed licensing isn't the cloud model — pricing varies with usage.
B.Variable operational expenditure (OpEx) — pay for what you use
Correct. OpEx/pay-per-use is the defining cloud economics shift.
C.One-time perpetual purchase
Perpetual purchase is a traditional software/hardware model.
D.Free infrastructure
AWS bills for usage — it's consumption-priced, not free.
Why this answer
Cloud replaces large upfront hardware purchases (CapEx) with variable pay-as-you-go spending (OpEx) — costs scale with actual consumption rather than projected capacity.
Correct answer: B · Last reviewed 2026-10-26
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