How to execute a cloud-to-cloud migration

Cloud infrastructure has given technology companies an unmatched capability to scale and save enormous infrastructure costs. But cloud migration is a sophisticated undertaking, involving several thousand to millions of files and configurations. For even the most seasoned software engineers, cloud-to-cloud migration is tricky.

Yet with the availability of several cloud platforms offering competitive pricing, cloud migration is becoming increasingly common.

What does cloud migration entail?

A cloud-to-cloud migration is when a company moves some or all of its data center capabilities from one cloud-based infrastructure service provider to another. Most frequent cloud-to-cloud migrations are between the top three contenders, i.e., AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure.

As the capabilities of the cloud are becoming more robust than ever before, more and more businesses are transitioning to the cloud. It remains a highly competitive space, so cloud services offer lucrative deals to companies to switch to their infrastructure.

Irrespective of what led to your company’s decision to switch from one cloud service to another, if the onus is on you to devise a strategy for successful cloud-to-cloud migration, we are here to help.

In this guide, we state the requirements and considerations of cloud-to-cloud migration to help you plan and successfully execute the migration.

1. Cloud migration planning

First, you need to decide whether the new cloud service supports the same file formats and configuration as your existing service provider or not. Cloud migration planning is critical in assessing your current environment and determining various factors that will affect cloud-to-cloud migration. This can include legacy data, essential data of the application, and application interoperability. Do you plan to keep your reliance on data the same, or synchronization of data can be deferred until the migration is completed?

These essential considerations will help you chart a solid plan and create a list of tools and strategies you will need during migration. You will quickly identify which data needs to be migrated and when. Also, at this stage, it is determined if any information needs any scrubbing or modification according to the new infrastructure. Another critical decision you must make is whether you will need to encrypt the data to transit between the service providers. It is valid for companies that handle sensitive customer data.

2. Create a migration business case 

Once you have determined the requirements of cloud migration, it’s time to explore cloud technology offered by the service providers that you will need during migration and their costs. You can evaluate the cost implications and feasibility of your cloud-to-cloud migration along three dimensions – operational benefits, architectural improvements, and cost savings in the long run.

It is better to build a business case by working with the new cloud provider to understand the options for cost savings depending on your proposed cloud migration. The infrastructure and storage requirements will differ depending on your technologies and applications. Most cloud service providers offer multiple pricing models, and you can get deep discounts if you give them long-term commitments. 

You can provide them with the approximate duration of the contract or the level of cloud spending you are willing to do. Also, consider using their dedicated migration engineering services to help you with the transfer.

3. Cloud data migration execution

After you have mapped out a plan for cloud-to-cloud migration and assessed the new cloud environment, it’s time to execute your migration. Here the goal is to carry out the migration with minimal or no disruption to business operations. Also, cloud migration should be done over the shortest period of time and at the lowest cost.

AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure provide in-built tools to help you migrate data within the cloud. Amazon offers several tools to simplify and accelerate cloud migration that you can explore here. Google Cloud also has a long list of cloud migration products, including data migration, application migration, and modernization. A complete list of Google Cloud migration products is available here. You can go here to learn more about Azure cloud migration services and products.

You must ensure that your business data services will not become inaccessible to users during cloud-to-cloud migration. You should serialize workload element migration to ensure services work in the new environment without disruption.

Conclusion 

Cloud-to-cloud migrations can be notoriously tricky if you are not strategizing your migration plan correctly. Having experienced cloud engineers on the team helps with the migration. However, we hope this guide gives you an idea to safely migrate your data, applications, or services from one cloud provider to another without disrupting your services for the end users.

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