Cloud Migration Challenges and How to Overcome Them
Cloud migration poses hurdles for organizations in the process of shifting infrastructure, applications, and data from on-premises systems to cloud-based platforms. The migration process demands meticulous planning and the secure execution of suitable measures to ensure a smooth and successful transition.
These cloud challenges involve a wide range of factors, including technical complexities, operational logistics, and security risks. Understanding and addressing these challenges is essential for businesses to grow and to fully leverage cloud computing technologies. Complete knowledge will help in minimizing risks and maximizing value.
Understanding Why Cloud Migration Is Difficult
Consider cloud migration as a puzzle, with multiple pieces each having its challenges, whether they be technical complexities, organizational issues, or logistical commitments. The type and size of data being moved, as well as the difference between the current and the new cloud environment, are factors contributing to its complexities. The lack of budget or resources still acts as a major barrier in completing cloud migration.
Common Challenges in Cloud Migration
Navigating to the cloud offers endless benefits, but every good thing comes with numerous challenges. In this blog, we’ll go through a few major challenges in migrating to the cloud that organizations face during cloud migration. Understanding the obstacles can help you achieve a smooth and successful transition.
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Legacy System Integration:
Most organizations nowadays prefer to invest in legacy systems; however, there is a high chance that they will not be readily compatible with cloud infrastructure. Migrating these systems to cloud-based platforms requires careful planning and execution to seamlessly integrate them without disrupting day-to-day operations.
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Data Security and Risks:
Security is indeed the top priority factor that organizations may think of while opting for the cloud migration process. Ensuring smooth migration with complete data security and compliance with regulations (e.g., GDPR, HIPAA, or PCI DSS) can be challenging, requiring robust encryption, access control, and identity management solutions.
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Performance and Delays:
Low performance and delays can be common challenges that organizations may face. Dealing with large volumes of data is one major reason, whereas other factors impacting performance include network bandwidth, data-transfer speeds, and the locations of the cloud data centers. Organizations must analyze their performance, and regular optimization becomes a basic requirement.
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Cost Management:
Most cloud migration companies promise cost-saving methods via their pay-as-you-go modules. However, the fact that cannot be denied is that the process can still be lengthy, making cost management challenging. Without proper optimization, monitoring, knowledge, expenses, and strategies, it can be complicated to set up a correct budget.
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Skills Gap and Training:
Cloud technologies evolve rapidly, and migrating to the cloud requires special skills, expertise, complete knowledge, and continuous learning. Organizations often feel a skill gap within the teams, lacking the necessary knowledge and expertise in cloud architecture, DevOps practices, and automation tools. Thus, investing in employee training via experienced cloud consultants can act as a future asset to bridge the gap and ensure a successful cloud migration process.
Strategies to Overcome Cloud Migration Challenges
In the process of creating a comprehensive and actionable cloud migration framework, the following strategies need to be followed to overcome cloud migration challenges:
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Assessment and Planning:
Start your migration journey with a thorough evaluation of existing infrastructure, applications, and regulatory requirements. Understand your client’s business goals and vision, and plan how migration can fit into that. Develop a roadmap that prioritizes your client's goals and requirements.
A brand called Betabrand, a crowd-funded clothing e-commerce platform, migrated from on-premise bare metal infrastructure to the cloud. They faced maintenance difficulties and scalability limitations. After considering the challenges, they planned to create multiple clusters in Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) and perform test migrations. Cloud streamlining enabled them to manage website surges better, specifically during big events like Christmas and Black Friday.
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Choose the Correct Cloud Service Provider:
Explore various providers and choose the best one that promises you the best offerings in terms of costs, security, support, and compliance. One of the biggest examples of working with the right cloud service providers is a well-known brand, Spotify. They transitioned from massive in-house data centers to GCP (Google Cloud Platform) to let their engineers focus on innovation solely. By picking GCP, they managed to reduce hybrid operation challenges and minimize disruption to product creation.
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Plan Your Cloud Architecture:
Based on your planning and client requirements, design your cloud architecture that best suits your client’s needs. Remember to include factors like storage, computation, networking, and services. Security and cloud assessment should also be considered while finalizing the design.
Spotify moved from one cloud provider to another due to some common cloud architecture challenges they faced during the process. This transition enabled them to enhance performance and optimize costs as well.
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Migration Planning:
From prioritizing and migration strategy to downtime management, all these factors are planned in this step. Decide the order and strategy of the migration process, minimizing service disruption during migration.
Companies like CarMax and even The State of Utah planned their migration to the cloud for better results. The state of Utah migrated from COBOL-based systems to the cloud within 18 months due to legacy technology challenges and to ensure a smooth transition.
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Execution and Migration:
Migrating in phases acts as the best idea to deliver positive results. Start with less critical systems to verify that the migration process works smoothly. Continuous monitoring can be a bonus point to ensure no data gets lost or encrypted.
By migrating to the cloud, a utility company reduced vegetation risk and inspected assets. Their approach with experienced cloud professionals ensured successful execution and minimized disruptions.
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Post-migration Process:
Continuous testing of all applications and data post-migration is one big step towards the success of the process. After migration, continuous optimization can help in maintaining costs and performance.
A food services company maintained dexterity and speed by optimizing its cloud environment post-migration. They explained that continuous optimization and testing were essential for their success.
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Review:
Evaluate and verify that the migration process was smooth and ensure it meets your business requirements.Betabrand evaluated the process post-migration to ensure that it met their business requirements and the results were satisfactory. Their strategic transition showed the importance of cloud computing under the guidance of experienced cloud professionals to all the other businesses in the market.
How Does AAHENT Help in Cloud Migration?
There are multiple organizations in this business, but choosing the best is a big decision. AAHENT promises to be the top organization that optimizes cloud migration for businesses by providing comprehensive assessment, planning, and execution services. With expert guidance, AAHENT assures to work best with the existing infrastructure, migration strategies, and the finest integration. The cost-effective plan and the smooth transition are the bonus points that AAHENT offers to its clients.