What is Cloud Migration? Benefits, Process & Tools

The process of shifting digital business functions to the cloud is referred to as the cloud migration. The process of Cloud migration could be identical to a physical shift. Instead of transferring and packing  real objects, it entails data, moving IT processes and apps from one particular data center to another.

What is Cloud Migration?

Changing a company’s digital assets, applications, IT resources, services and database into the cloud, completely or partially, is referred to as cloud migration. The process of switching from the one cloud to the another is also called cloud migration.

Industries that desire to get away from old and more inefficient legacy infrastructures, such as the ageing servers or potentially faulty firewall appliances, or abandoned software or hardware solutions that are no longer performing at peak capacity, are now turning to the cloud. So, the companies are moving toward the cloud due to the reason above.

Why do Businesses Migrate to the Cloud?

The reasons for companies migrating to cloud are numerous and varied. One major benefit of working on the cloud is that you have access to nearly unlimited computing resources. Some of the major reasons why businesses should move their resources to the public cloud:

1. Scalability

The Cloud computing can readily scale to the serve for bigger workloads and additional users. Business has to buy & set up software licences, physical servers, network equipment, and storage to scale up business services in traditional IT settings.

2. Cost

As cloud service providers seek the upgrades and maintenance  firms who migrate to the cloud can save a lot of money on IT. They will devote more dedicated resources to the innovations, such as developing new objects or improving existing ones.

3. Performance

Migrating to the cloud can enhance the performance and impromisze the end-user experience. The Cloud-hosted website and applications can easily scale to provide support to more users or to deliver maximum throughput, and they could run near end-users to decrease the network latency.

4. Flexibility

Users can access cloud services and data from anywhere, whether they’re employees, users or customers. This makes it easier for a company to grow into new markets, provide services to worldwide clients, and allow its personnel to work more flexibly.

What are the Benefits of Migrating to the Cloud?

This includes the lower total cost of the ownership (TCO), increased innovation opportunities and faster time to market. Access to the cloud brings flexibility and agility, critical in meeting changing customer and market expectations.

1. Scalability and Elasticity

Cloud computing improves scalability by allowing businesses to add or remove resources to meet demand instantly. Elasticity, like scalability, refers to the ability to scale up or down memory, storage resources and computer processing to meet the ever-changing demands without worrying about cloud capacity planning. Scalability is made possible by elasticity.

2. Effectiveness and cost savings

You can only charge for the resources you use when using the cloud, and this offers you access to resources that will take a lot of effort and money to maintain on your own, which is related to scalability. Scaling up via standard IT methods is expensive. It takes months of preparation, a large upfront investment in hardware, electricity to keep everything running and cool, and professional IT staff to get it all up and to run. With the cloud, your cloud provider can do all of this in seconds.

3. Simplification of IT and low maintenance

Computer software and hardware maintenance is a full-time profession. Employees do not need to devote time to tedious equipment maintenance that does not directly contribute to business goals while using the public cloud. Your cloud service provider takes care of the infrastructure, allowing your tech wizards to focus on achieving business goals.

4. Compliance and Security

The majority of cloud providers are large corporations that rely on them. That’s why they go to great lengths to assure security and compliance, which includes staying up to date on the latest developments and trends to keep your sensitive data safe in the cloud. The policies, technology, and controls that public cloud providers often bring are typically a considerable step up over the normal organization’s security standards. Considerations accompany this for nearly any industry-specific compliance requirements.

What are the Types of Cloud To Migrate?

Depending on the services a company needs, cloud computing can be implemented in various ways. A corporation must consider two criteria while planning its cloud migration strategy. Different cloud deployment model includes—multi-cloud, private cloud, public cloud, and hybrid cloud. The service category is the second component.

1. Public Cloud

A third-party vendor (a cloud service provider) owns and operates public cloud services through the internet. These services could be provided for free or on a pay-per-use basis to anyone who wants to use or purchase them. The benefits of the public cloud are numerous, which may explain why it is the most popular deployment method. Examples are Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Alibaba Cloud, Google Cloud Platform, Oracle Cloud and IBM Cloud. 

2. Private Cloud

A single organization uses and owns all cloud resources with a private cloud. Government and financial companies seeking utmost control or customization will find this strategy appealing. The private cloud could be housed in an on-site of the data centre or hosted by a third-party service in another location. Dell, IBM, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Oracle, AWS, Microsoft and Google.

3. Hybrid Cloud

A hybrid cloud refers to a cloud that incorporates characteristics of both private and public clouds and allows resources to flow between them. A hybrid cloud is ideal for businesses that want some private cloud functionality but also want to take advantage of the public cloud’s many advantages.

4. Multicloud

The usage of various cloud services in a single environment is known as multi-cloud. This can include a combination of public and private clouds and the use of a variety of public cloud providers to lessen dependency on a single source and reap the benefits of several providers. Some examples are Azure and AWS.

Cloud Migration Process

• Evaluate the “why.”
• Plan for what’s moving and how
• Migrate data and applications
• Modernize and move ahead

Cloud Migration Tools

Large public cloud service providers such as AWS, Azure, and GCP want to help you migrate your system to the cloud, therefore they provide a host of tools to assist you. If you really want to throw money at them, they’ll take it gratefully. While moving to the cloud can save money, cloud charges can easily spin out of control. That’s why it’s vital to plan properly and modify operations as needed, utilising all available resources. Things that work flawlessly on-premises can turn out to be costly mistakes in the cloud. When you make the transfer to the cloud, you should figure out how much your installation will cost.

Examine the choices offered by your public cloud service provider. Examples include the AWS Pricing Calculator, Google Cloud Pricing Calculator, and Azure Calculator. Two other early-on products to look into are Microsoft Azure Advisor and AWS Trusted Advisor. These offer real-time cloud best practices guidance and can help with cost savings, security, and performance.