Cloud-based badges make sense if you have locations with small staffs and no HR people or managers. Like if you're controlling access to a microwave tower on the top of a mountain.
But badges-in-the-cloud for an office building full of people who are being supervised by supposedly trusted managers, and all of whom has been vetted for security and by HR, is just being cheap.
Like the 1980's AT&T commercials used to say: "You get what you pay for."
I'm not convinced that's true, or at least certainly not an order of magnitude. Wouldn't a badge system hosted on-prem also need a user management system (database), a hosted management interface, have a dependency on the LAN, and need most of the same hardware? Such a system would also need to be running on a local server(s), which introduces points of failure around power continuity/surges, physical security, ongoing maintenance, etc.
In addition, you're forgetting the thousands of points of failure between the building and the cloud provider. Everything from routers being DDOSed by script kiddies to ransomware gangs attacking infrastructure to Phil McCracken slicing a fiber line with his new post hole digger.
Adding complexity and moving parts never reduces points of failure. It can reduce daily operating worries as long as everything works, but it can't reduce points of failure. It also means than someday when it breaks, the root causes will be more opaque.
also, building access systems should be hosted in the building they reside in for security reasons anyways.
Depending on the cloud is certainly a very stupid decision. keeping everything inside the building is better, but still not ideal.
