Streamline your IBM Workload Migration to Azure

As technology continues to evolve at a rapid pace, businesses face the challenge of keeping up with the latest advancements while maintaining their existing infrastructure. For organisations utilising IBM technologies, migrating to Azure can be a transformative step towards achieving enhanced scalability, agility, and cost-efficiency.

However, navigating the complexities of such a migration can be a daunting task, requiring expertise, careful planning, and precise execution.

That’s where Responsiv steps in; your trusted migration partner, delivering a seamless and successful transition of your IBM workload from its current hosting platform to Azure.

Business Drivers

There are a number of reasons as to why a business will choose to move to Azure (or any cloud provider) as opposed to their current cloud host or on-prem solution.

• • Closing of traditional data centres
    • by moving to cloud platforms should lead to [capex & opex] savings. There are a number of hidden costs that are difficult to estimate, for example, network charges (ingress, egress & cross region) and backup storage.
  • Current software licensing perceived as expensive or not cloud friendly
  • Software is not seen as strategic; we often find that companies underestimate the business impact of replacing an incumbent technology
  • Technical skills are notoriously hard to find and retain

Scenario

The CTO has this brilliant idea that the acme.com should close all it’s expensive, slow to respond to business need, difficult to manage data centres and move everything to Azure.

A year into the project they have 60% of everything moved over and it’s looking like a blinding success! At the end of year two they have 75% of everything moved over and the migration is “running out of steam,” there is a bunch of IBM software running critical systems that are difficult to replicate in Azure without rebuilding them from scratch; worse still the deadline for the data centre closure is rapidly approaching and “heads could roll” if that is missed.

This isn’t a work of fiction, we are working with several companies at the moment to fix exactly the scenario detailed above. 

The migration of the business functions that are running on IBM software are usually business critical with a significant risk associated with any downtime or loss of function. They have often been running for many years and the expertise on the development have moved on to other projects or left the organisation.

The Challenge

Why is it that the migration project is not going as seamlessly as desired? There are a number of reasons why you could be halfway through your project timeline and find there is a stagnation or rise of issues. Migrating your IBM workload to Azure is a multi-faceted process that demands comprehensive understanding and experience across both platforms.

If you don’t want the ‘heads to roll’ outcome, then you should be aware of these common challenges, and plan to mitigate the risks for your migration:

1 – Technical Complexity

The IBM and Azure ecosystems differ significantly in terms of infrastructure, services, and deployment models. Migrating workloads, applications, and data from one platform to another can present numerous technical hurdles, requiring in-depth knowledge and expertise to overcome.

2 – Resource Constraints

Organisations often lack the necessary resources, skilled personnel, and time required to execute a migration project effectively. Balancing day-to-day operations with the migration process can strain internal teams, leading to delays, errors, and increased costs.

3 – Business Continuity

Ensuring minimal disruption to business operations during any form of migration is crucial. Maintaining data integrity, application availability, and seamless user experiences throughout the transition is a complex task that demands meticulous planning and execution.

4 – Optimisation Opportunities

Migrating to Azure presents an opportunity to optimise your existing IBM workloads and leverage the advanced capabilities offered by Azure services. Identifying and implementing these optimisations requires a deep understanding of both platforms and their respective features.

5 – Standards

The problem with standards is software provider interprets them slightly differently and “enhances” the standard to offer more functionality or possibly lock users into a specific product. Importing “standard definitions” from one providers product to a different manufactures product rarely works perfectly. From experience this follows the 80/20 rule where about 80% works with little or no remediation the remaining 20% is problematic.

If you are dealing with migrating to or from products that do not support open standards then the project becomes a new build rather than migration. The source product can only be used as a specification for the new build solution.

6 – Development & infrastructure Freeze

Forcing a change freeze on the existing production solution for an extended period is unlikely to be acceptable to the business. Some projects will have a go live date that dictates release into the existing production solution, these projects will then have to be added to the migration “list”. There is likely to be upgrades of the existing software and operating systems during the migration project.

7 – Parallel Development

Projects will have a target environment that they are developing & testing against and deadline to be met that are not related to the Azure migration. Robust project management is required to reduce the amount of rework generated by development teams targeting the wrong environment due to delays or lack of information.

The diagram represents a single standalone application requiring a patch and a new feature after the migration process has begun. If the new feature gets to on-premise production before the Azure go-live then the Azure go-live must be delayed alternatively the new feature must be delayed and redeveloped in the Azure development environment. In most cases there will be a complex dependency tree where multiple applications will have to be moved as a group to ensure business continuity.

Why Do Migrations Stall Near the End?

Dependencies

Most company IT solutions evolve over time and there is a tendency to build tightly coupled integration, typically synchronous connections between “islands of data”. The resulting IT landscape is likely to have limited documentation and be very difficult to “unpick” individual packages to move to Azure.

Skills Shortage

Difficulty can arise in understanding the design and functionality of the incumbent solution and translating that to the new technology. The skill sets required to do the translation are often difficult and costly to obtain, stalling the project from completing or progressing.

How Do We Fix It?

In short, we look at the project at a higher level, in most cases the moving of the IBM software is only a small part of the migration to Azure and the business goal is the closure of the data centres. We aim to take the migration to Azure out of the critical path by breaking the problem in to two parts.

“Lift & shift” the current solution to Azure as is, this gives us a parallel cloud environment where we can move business functions over then test & verify them before switching over. At this point the on-premise data centre is freed up and can be decommissioned.

Once everything “IBM” is running in Azure, we then investigate the best options to migrate the Individual business functions.

• • Some parts of the business solutions may have a limited life and will not be economical to migrate, simply let them “wither on the vine”. As these components reduce in size or usage software licences could be reduced.
  • Some parts of the business solutions will be “low hanging fruit” relatively easy and cost effective to migrate to “Native” Azure and as these components migrate software licences could be reduced.
  • Some parts of the business solutions will need to be migrated and will require significant development effort. This is where IBM development skills & Azure development skills are required to efficiently migrate the functionality and ensure performance and scalability are not compromised.
  • Some parts of the business solutions may be uneconomical to migrate for the foreseeable future. This often be because the IBM software has a specific feature or functionality that Azure does not provide currently. This category of business solution will eventually drop in to one of the three categories above. A regular review of the outstanding IBM components should be carried out.

Key Considerations

When moving a business function from IBM technology to Azure technology a simple gap analysis will often identify functionality provided by IBM that is not available in Azure. Where this appears, a redesign will be required. The redesign requires skilled developers who can fully understand the IBM developed code & developers who understand the best way to implement the required functionality in Azure. It is highly unlikely that a single developer will have both skillsets. [Responsiv can provide hybrid teams with the required skills]

Maintaining business continuity while migrating the business services is a critical consideration. It is impossible to move everything in one go, so a well throughout technical approach with good project planning will improve the chances of the migration success. 

During the migration to cloud there will have to be periods where no development or code fixes can be carried out on the legacy runtimes to avoid developer working to a moving target. The risk here is that companied usually have at least a year’s worth of pipeline for development and upgrades for every software package. Careful planning & project management is required to avoid negative business impacts.

Azure virtual servers appear to require more virtual CPUs than “normal” data centre installations, this is based on the “Azure Migrate tooling”. Careful analysis of the IBM licencing including licence management should be carried out if IBM software is to be migrated to Azure.

The IBM software still needs maintaining during the migration period, we have seen situations where software has been left to go out of support because “it’s going soon so don’t bother”, resulting in cyber security audits failing.

Data transport costs, most cloud offerings have charges for data transport within the cloud environment and for Ingress or Egress. Predicting the transport cost is not a simple task particularly with High Availability or Disaster recovery across geographical regions.

Possible Approaches

These are some possible approaches that can be taken to migrate workloads from their current hosting platform to Azure.

Lift and Shift

Almost all IBM software can be operated in Azure so if the driving factor is to close a data centre, then simply moving the IBM functionality into the Azure environment solves this problem. This option works well as a solution or interim step. Azure offer tools to assist in moving virtual machines into the Azure environment.

An alternative would be to build a new installation of the IBM software in the cloud and move the developed code into the new environment.

Move to Native Azure

This option is really a development project using the existing IBM installation as a high-level design template. IBM software is functionally very rich (sometimes at the cost of ease of use), no two software products have exactly the same features & functions.

Cloud Bridge

Responsiv use a pattern where we place an integration component in Azure that links with the existing on-prem integration components. The linked integration layers are then used to optimise data access as the while the functionality is being moved to Azure, this also allows us to optimise the Network bandwidth usage to some extent.

Responsiv’s Advantage

At Responsiv, we recognise the challenges organisations face during migrations of IBM workload to Azure. We offer a comprehensive Proof of Value that highlights the value we bring to your migration journey:

1 – Expert Guidance and Support

Our experienced team of migration specialists will assess your existing IBM environment, identify dependencies, and design a tailored migration roadmap. We’ll guide you through the entire process, leveraging our deep understanding of IBM technologies to ensure a smooth transition.

2 – End-to-End Migration Services

From workload assessment and planning to migration execution and post-migration support, Responsiv provides end-to-end migration services. We handle the intricate technical details, minimise downtime, and ensure data integrity, enabling you to focus on core business operations.

3 – Minimised Risk and Disruption

Our proven methodology and best practices minimise the risks associated with migration, ensuring business continuity throughout the process. We employ robust testing and validation techniques to identify and address potential issues before they impact your operations.

4 – Optimisation and Cost Savings

As part of the migration process, we identify opportunities to optimize your workloads on Azure, leveraging the full potential of its services. This enables you to enhance performance, scalability, and cost-efficiency, maximizing your return on investment.

5 – Seamless Collaboration

Responsiv values collaborative partnerships, working closely with your team to understand your business requirements and tailor the migration strategy accordingly. We ensure effective communication, transparent reporting, and knowledge transfer, empowering your organisation to become self-sufficient in managing the Azure environment.

Conclusion

Migrating your IBM tech to Azure is a significant undertaking that demands careful planning, technical expertise, and a partner you can trust.

Responsiv brings a wealth of experience, proven methodologies, and deep knowledge of both IBM and Azure platforms to streamline your migration journey. We ensure a successful transition to Azure, empowering your organisation to unlock the full potential of cloud-based innovation.

Contact us today to embark on your transformational journey with confidence.