What is a Cloud Migration Strategy?

Circle chart pointing to different cloud migration strategies

A cloud migration strategy is a comprehensive plan and approach that an organization develops to guide the process of moving its IT resources, including applications, data, and workloads, from on-premises environments or other cloud platforms to a cloud computing environment, such as Microsoft Azure, AWS, Google Cloud, or others. A cloud migration strategy aims to ensure a successful and efficient transition to the cloud while minimizing risks and disruptions.

The exact path you take for migrating to the cloud depends on your environment’s size, complexity, resource availability, risk mitigation, and the time available for the migration.  Other factors that can influence your migration path include the technical skill sets available to execute such migrations.

Fortunately, there are several well-known cloud migration strategies available to consider. These are:

-          Rehost (Lift and Shift)

-          Refactor

-          Rearchitect (Rebuild)

-          Replatform (Reimagine)

-          Repurchase (SaaS Adoption)

-          Retire

Rehost (Lift and Shift):

In a rehost or lift-and-shift migration, existing on-premises virtual machines (VMs) or applications are moved to Azure with minimal or no modification. This approach is relatively quick and straightforward, but it may not fully leverage Azure's cloud-native capabilities. Rehosting is suitable for applications that do not need significant changes and where speed of migration is a priority.

Typically, these types of migrations closely resemble migrations between two on-premises locations. It can be a great entry point for new IT departments adopting Azure.  In Azure these Lift and Shifts can be achieved by using tools such as Azure Migration or Azure Site Recovery. While this may be a relatively quick and straightforward approach, a proper understanding of the resources you will use in Azure is paramount for the success of the migration. Additionally, Rehosting can serve as a stepping stone for refactoring in the future.

Refactor (Replatform):

Refactoring involves minimal changes to the application code or configuration to optimize it for Azure. This may include updating the application to Azure platform services, such as Azure SQL Database or Azure App Service, instead of running on traditional VMs. Refactoring can provide cost savings and improved performance.

This option is often chosen over performing a full rearchitecture for several reasons, including:

-          Cost Considerations

-          Risk Mitigation

-          Quick Wins

-          Minimal Disruption

-          Business Continuity 

Cost Considerations:

Refactoring is often a more cost-effective and time-efficient approach compared to a full rearchitecture. It enables organizations to make gradual enhancements to an existing application, avoiding the extensive resource requirements associated with a complete overhaul. The costs associated with rearchitecting go beyond infrastructure and cloud services; they encompass the expenses related to assembling the necessary team to execute the rearchitecting process.

Risk Mitigation:

A full rearchitecture can introduce significant risks, including potential downtime and disruptions to business operations. Refactoring allows organizations to make changes gradually and assess the impact at each step, reducing the risk of unexpected issues. This is especially important in organizations new to Azure.

Quick Wins:

Refactoring can lead to quick wins by addressing immediate pain points or performance bottlenecks in the application. This can improve user satisfaction and productivity without waiting for a more extensive rearchitecture.

Minimal Disruption:

Refactoring can be performed with minimal disruption to end-users. It often involves making code-level changes and optimizations while keeping the overall architecture intact. This is especially beneficial for mission-critical applications.

Business Continuity:

Refactoring can help maintain business continuity. It allows organizations to improve the application gradually without the need for a complete redevelopment, ensuring that existing business processes can continue uninterrupted.

Refactoring can serve as a stepping stone for Rearchitecting. This is because refactoring allows organizations to take an iterative approach to improvement. They can start by addressing the most critical or outdated parts of the application and progressively enhance it over time, aligning with changing business needs. In addition, refactoring will give an organization the opportunity to train their existing team and grow their team so they can ease into rearchitecting.

Rearchitect (Rebuild):

Rearchitecting, or rebuilding, involves redesigning and redeveloping an application to leverage Azure's cloud-native services and capabilities fully. This approach can lead to greater scalability, resilience, and cost efficiency but typically requires more time and resources compared to rehosting or refactoring.

Replatform (Reimagine):

This is an extension of refactoring, where organizations reimagine their applications to take full advantage of Azure's capabilities, such as serverless computing, containerization, and microservices. This migration strategy often involves a more substantial overhaul of the application architecture and is well-suited for organizations looking to modernize legacy applications.

Repurchase (SaaS Adoption):

Organizations may sometimes opt to replace existing software applications with Software as a Service (SaaS) solutions available on Azure or Microsoft 365. This can simplify management and reduce the need for infrastructure management and maintenance. For example, moving from Exchange Server to Exchange Online or a SharePoint Server to SharePoint Online.

This option typically results in cost savings at several levels, including:

-          Costs related to hardware

-          Costs related to maintaining the software applications.

Its important to note that this migration strategy takes time. There is a lot of planning involved in making the transition to SaaS.  For example, migrating from SharePoint Server requires an assessment to be performed. In some cases, a complete SaaS Adoption may not be possible due to the limitations in SaaS versions of the software.

Retire:

Some workloads or applications may no longer be needed or are redundant. In such cases, organizations can choose to retire these workloads rather than migrate them to Azure. This reduces unnecessary costs and complexity. This usually occurs when repurchasing, as mentioned previously.

Conclusion:

Each migration scenario presents its unique challenges, and the complexity of migration often requires the utilization of multiple strategies. However, what's often overlooked in these strategies is the ultimate objective of transitioning to the Cloud.

When embarking on the cloud adoption journey, it's crucial to be prepared and fully aware of its advantages, including scalability and automation. A notable advantage is the ability to rapidly scale applications to handle increased workloads, which would have entailed substantial on-premises hardware investments. Additionally, the capacity to automate infrastructure deployment through a wide array of tools is another significant benefit. This automation enhances efficiency and minimizes the risk of disasters stemming from human errors.

If you are presently in the midst of migrating to the cloud or a Microsoft Partner assisting clients in their cloud migration journey, we encourage you to get in touch with us. We're eager to connect with you and gain insights into your ongoing initiatives.