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Cloud migration process

A simple, non-standard evaluation

Before proceeding to the first step of the migration process, calculations of total costs of implementing the cloud, on-premises and hybrid solution should be compared. By doing such an analysis, you will be able to assess which cloud environment will be the most cost-effective model for your company. Next, it is crucial to evaluate the load configuration. This will enable the development of a detailed verification plan and an easy transition to the loads of the IT infrastructure your business requires.

Defining business and technical requirements

Maximize the benefits of cloud migration and achieve your business objectives. When transitioning your ERP system to the cloud platform, it is easier to identify potential opportunities and obstacles and tackle the limitations related to the on-premise implementations. Tools for effective planning and evaluation as well as in-built and powerful capacity planning algorithms enable you to choose the right size of the cloud and to modify its architecture.

Simple cloud migration strategies

You can also integrate your local infrastructure with the cloud platform and use a consistent and integrated hybrid solution. As a result, your staff will be able to work smarter and faster with powerful tools that ensure successful workload migration as well as the verification of all cloud-based applications and dependencies.

Speed up your business growth with the hybrid cloud

Whether you migrate some of the workloads or the data center, by using the existing Window Server and Software Assurance licenses, you can fully benefit from the cloud technology. You can enjoy long-term benefits and make enormous savings by adopting cloud computing and choosing Microsoft Azure hybrid platform.

Test deployment of the data migration tools

Once the application and data have been transitioned to Microsoft Azure platform, the process can be simplified by providing two versions showing the limitations. The first option allows for the migration of the existing local database to the cloud platform. With the other, new, option, it is possible to implement Azure SQL Database services and gain access to reliable features and transfer hundreds of application databases.

Successful cloud migration in 3 steps

While preparing to move on-premise applications to the cloud, new ideas emerge on how to create a project roadmap. With small and medium-sized businesses, the procedure is usually quick and simple. In the case of SaaS services, basic computer skills will be required. Small and medium-sized enterprises, in particular, should attach the utmost importance to cloud solutions, as the cloud provides significant savings and an unrivalled level of security. When using cloud environments and with low investment, they are able to respond swiftly to dynamic market conditions, scale resources to meet the increasing demand and implement new functions – almost instantly.

 

For companies with more complex IT structure, more methodological approach may be useful. Experience shows that three main phases can be distinguished: experimenting, migration and transformation.

Experimenting phase

During this phase, IT staff must learn how to use the cloud environment. Simple cloud-based applications are developed or various migration scenarios are analyzed. A number of key questions should be answered, such as: Which features provided by the cloud will be the most useful for the company? How to extend and streamline operations across various departments by ensuring access to the cloud from various devices and locations? How to standardize some of the processes? The company is looking for solutions that can be transitioned to the cloud and those that should be eliminated. For IT departments responsible for developing industry and business-specific applications, it is a great opportunity to gain a thorough understanding of how the cloud processes function. IT staff can try out methods for testing and launching the application, as well as activity monitoring.

Migration phase

During this phase (which often the most demanding), the IT portfolio is moved to the cloud, according to one of the above-mentioned scenarios. Employees from several departments (IT, HR and technical staff), as well as the management, security experts and lawyers must cooperate and be engaged actively in the coordination of the entire migration process.

Transformation phase

In this phase, selected PaaS (Platform as a Service) applications are enhanced or extended with new features so that all benefits of cloud computing can be exploited fully. As a result, they are more closely integrated with other services and better adjusted to use big data, learning systems and work with analytical tools. When using SaaS (Software as a Service) model, subsequent functions are activated gradually. In such cases, it is possible to reduce the workload of employees who need time to learn how to use the cloud environment and minimize the efficiency loss.