What is Cloud Migration ?

What is Cloud Migration?

Cloud Migration is simply the adoption of cloud computing. It is the process of transferring data, application code, and other technology-related business processes from an on-premise or legacy infrastructure to the cloud environment.

Cloud Migration is a phenomenal transformation in the business information system domain as it provides adequate services for the growing needs of businesses. However, moving data to the cloud requires preparation and planning in deciding on an approach.

The other use-case for Cloud Migration is cloud to cloud transfer.

Types of Cloud Migration

The process of Cloud Migration creates a great deal of concern in the business and corporate world who have to prepare for many contingencies that come along with it. The type and degree of migration may differ from one organization to another. While certain organizations may opt for a complete migration, others may do so in part while others remain on-premises. Some process-heavy organizations may require more than one cloud service.

In addition to the degree of adoption, other parameters categorize Cloud Migration. These are some of the more commonly seen use-cases.

Lift and Shift

This process involves moving software from on-premise resources to the cloud without any changes in the application or a process used before. It is the fastest type of cloud migration available and involves fewer work disruptions since it involves only infrastructure, information, and security teams. Furthermore, it is more cost-effective compared to other methods available.

The only downside to this method is that it does not maximize the advantages of the performance and the cloud’s versatility as it involves only moving the application to a new location. Therefore it’s more suitable for companies with regular peak schedules and who follow market trends. Consider it as a first step in the adoption of the Cloud Migration process.

The Shift to SaaS

This method involves outsourcing one or more preferred applications to a specialized cloud service provider. Through this model, businesses can off-load less business-critical processes and be more focused on their core applications. This setup will lead to them becoming more streamlined and competitive.

While this method provides the ability to personalize your application, it sometimes can cause problems in the support model provided by the SaaS (Software-as-a-service) platform. It’s risky enough that you could lose some competitive edge in your industry. This method is more suitable for non-customer facing applications and routine functionalities such as email and payroll.

Legacy Application Refactoring

Cloud migration processes allow companies to replicate their legacy applications completely into the cloud platform by refactoring them. In this way, you can allow legacy applications to function and concurrently build new applications to replace the old ones on the cloud.

Refactoring lets you prioritize business processes by moving less critical ones to the cloud, first. This method is cost-effective, improves response time, and helps in prioritizing updates for better interactions.

Re-platforming

Re-platforming is a cloud migration process that involves replacing the application code to make it cloud-native. This process is the most resource-intensive type of migration, as it requires a lot of planning.

Completely rewriting business processes can also be quite costly. Nonetheless, this is the migration method that allows for total flexibility and brings you all the benefits of the cloud to its fullest extent.

Benefits of Cloud Migration

Businesses tend to spend quite a lot when it comes to software development and deployment. But cloud migration offers a variety of methods to choose from, and they can be used to access SaaS at a much lower cost while safely storing and sharing data.

Cloud migration benefits include:

Cost Saving

Maintaining and managing a physical data center can be costly. But cloud migration allows curtailing operational expenses since cloud service providers like SaaS or even PaaS takes care of maintenance and upgrades of these data centers for a minimal upfront cost.

Flexibility

Cloud migration facilitates upward or downward business expansions based on its necessities. Small scale businesses can easily scale up their processes into new territories, and large scale businesses can expand their services to an international audience through cloud migration.

This flexibility is possible in terms of expanding horizontally through globally distributed data centers as well through integrating hybrid cloud solutions such as AI, Machine Learning (ML), and image processing.

Quality Performance

Cloud migration allows for maintaining better interactions and communications within business communities due to the higher visibility of data. It also facilitates quick decision making since it reduces the time spent on infrastructure.

Automatic Updates

Updating systems can be a tedious task, especially for large scale companies, as they can require prolonged analysis. With Cloud migration, companies no longer need to worry about this as the infrastructure is off-premises, and cloud service providers are likely to take care of automatic updates.

Enhanced Security

Many studies have proven that data stored in a cloud environment is more secure compared to data in on-premise data centers. Cloud vendors are experts in data security and secure data proactively by updating their mechanisms regularly.

Ensuring Business Continuity

Businesses often need to set up additional resources for disaster recovery. Cloud migration provides smart and inexpensive disaster management solutions. It ensures that applications are functional and available even during and after critical incidents, ensuring business continuity.

How Mentis can help you with Cloud Migration ?