Comment by sudhirj

This is one of the biggest arguments I see for serverless (AWS Lambda + DynamoDB) or at least managed PaaS systems (Google App Engine, Heroku with RDS or CloudSQL). These systems may seem to cost more for some workload curves (or might even be cheaper for your curve), but the difference is worth it because you're paying for specialized 24/7 dev-ops teams whose only job is to keep these systems running smoothly, and by definition they're already familiar with running workloads orders of magnitude bigger than yours. Even then the platforms might be cheaper because you're only paying for a fraction of the dev-ops team's salaries, but you get their full benefit.