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Migrations, Moves, and Transitions (The Data Centre Move)

A Migration and Transition is the culmination of all the planning and effort undertaken within the overall Data Centre or Cloud Migration. Data Centre Moves can be undertaken in many different ways and each one is aligned to a risk rating.

Rack Migration

Racks with IT equipment installed are moved as a complete unit – not a recommended solution – but in an emergency is a valid option.

Lift and Shift of IT Hardware

With the right preparation and planning is a valid option and still widely used globally today.

Hybrid Migration

A mix of Hardware Lift and Shift and Virtual Migrations. The most common current Migration – involves soft/virtual moves plus some physical moves.

Virtual Migration

The destination Data Centre has an installation of seed infrastructure, or the services are provided by a Cloud Services Provider

The Migration Process

The Migration Project will flow through a process where the current data is collected and used as a basis for the development of the Migration Strategy, Design, Planning and Migration Stages.

Identifying the Design and what the compliance and technical impact of designs are to the Migration process.

The Migration Event(s) is carefully planned using Runbooks (sometimes referred to as the Minute by Minute Plans) identifying the agreed tasks and team responsibilities for the Migration Event(s).

Key to the completion of the Migrations will be the testing of services to ensure that services are recovered and are restored as they were before (includes access and performance of Applications).

Not to be underestimated the completion of the Migration is followed by the Decommission. With Sustainability requirements a key Corporate Social Responsibility, the destruction of data on disks and the recycling of hardware before making good and returning the old Data Centre to the Service Provider effectively to reduce any further fees are a key success factor.

IT migration process

BUSINESS BENEFITS

The reason for a Data Centre Move are far and varied, but the key to a successful Data Centre Move Project are meeting key deadlines, reducing risks of service interruptions to the business and maintaining relevant compliance and security standards – the benefits to the business are usually rarely seen by the end user but they can include the following –

Improved system performance

A well-executed Data Centre move can lead to improved server, network, and storage performance, leading to faster processing times, reduced downtime, and improved user experience.

Cost savings (see PTS Case Studies)

Through consolidation of IT hardware and Data Centres, organisations have the opportunity to reduce the overall costs associated with maintaining multiple Data Centre facilities. This can also result in lower hardware and software licensing costs. Cost savings will be recognised across a number of years as initial  migration costs impact immediate savings.

Increased scalability

A good Data Centre move can create an environment that is more flexible and scalable, allowing organisations to quickly respond to changing business needs and growth requirements.

Enhanced security and compliance

A well-planned Data Centre Move can ensure that data is secured and meets regulatory requirements, reducing the risk of security breaches

Improved Disaster Recovery

A migration/move project can lead to the implementation of a better Disaster Recovery solutions, such as backup and recovery processes, redundant infrastructure, and offsite data backups.

Improved resource utilisation

By moving to modern and efficient Data Centre infrastructure, organisations can improve the use of their IT resources and increase productivity.

An effective Data Centre Move can provide a range of business benefits, including cost savings, improved performance, improved scalability, enhanced security and compliance, improved disaster recovery, and effective resource utilisation.