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The Risks of Cloud Migration and How to Overcome Them

Tom Joyce

Tom Joyce

The Risks of Cloud Migration and How to Overcome Them

Migrating to the Cloud has been proven to improve productivity, and has enabled even the smallest business to become truly global.


And yet, there are still organisations that haven’t gone all-in, relying on legacy hardware and software to get critical work done. The problem is – it won’t be long until in-house server rooms and legacy software are all but dead.


Hardware becomes obsolete fast, and maintaining even the simplest server setup is expensive. With rising energy costs, and workforces needing more money to cope with the cost of living, that’s only going to get worse.

Cloud solutions can put an end to all of that. Even in the most complex of computing ecosystems. Private Clouds can be built bespoke in data centres around the world, to achieve practically anything a self-hosted solution can do.

They can do this while being more resilient, more secure, and more collaborative. With a dedicated Private Cloud solution running on next-generation switching, performance can be even faster than a self-hosted solution; with latencies as low as ~1ms at flagship data centres.


While Cloud solutions might lack the immediate access and bespokeness of self-hosted solutions, and can cost slightly more over their lifetime, there is simply no way that a business can exceed what Cloud platforms can offer – unless they are prepared to build their own world-class infrastructure.


Having said all of this, migrating to the Cloud has to be handled with extreme care: especially with sensitive, operations-critical data. These are the common risks of migrating to the Cloud – and how to overcome them.

Common Cloud migration risks

Incompatibility

If the complexity of your current architecture poses a challenge, this can slow the Cloud migration progress down to a halt. To prepare your IT architecture for Cloud migration, you first need to audit your legacy architecture


During this audit, you should find and resolve technical debt, establish which parts of the system are dependent on each other to function, and create extremely detailed documentation – including a roadmap to the goal.


You may find during this phase that you’ll need to adopt a Hybrid Cloud solution – with elements of Private, Public and in-house infrastructure, which facilitate the migration.

Data residency

One of the biggest challenges with Cloud migration is data residency. Some states, including those under GDPR, are strict on where sensitive data can be stored. It might be the case that your data must be stored locally: within the country, continent, or geopolitical region.


Public Cloud solutions are globally distributed, with no single physical location. Data can be moved as the Cloud provider sees fit. This, naturally, is at odds with data residency.

To overcome this, a Private Cloud should be prescribed. This is where you own physical hardware, installed at a data centre of your choice. This keeps all data local, and keeps your business compliant with the law.

Data loss

Moving data always carries a risk of loss. Human error, a poor connection, timeouts, lossy formatting – any number of things can go wrong. At the end of a large-scale data migration, some of your files may be missing, incomplete, or corrupted. 


But this can be overcome with good planning and preparation.

An expert-led Cloud migration will counter this with meticulous data backup, restoration, and disaster recovery. Backups will be Cloud-based, on physical media, and reproduced to a high level of redundancy, to ensure that even if the worst happens, your data can be restored with minimal downtime.


The upload and monitoring of data should also be phased, not carried out in bulk – and data connections should have fallbacks in place to allow for continued transfer if one connection is interrupted.

Security

This is a major concern for companies looking to migrate to the Cloud. But it’s not as risky as it seems.


Popular Cloud providers like Azure and AWS provide security as a service – but let’s be real. Security is frankly a non-issue provided that you trust your Cloud partner, and have access and permissions under strict control and monitoring.


Public and Private data centres are extremely secure environments, physically and virtually. If you get the configuration right, your data security will be second to none.

Latency

Cloud migration can introduce high latency times. For most people, this goes unnoticed – but for critical operations or consumer apps, a few seconds of delay can be extremely damaging.


A fleet of Private Cloud installations at local data centres can significantly reduce transfer times – but this can be a costly solution, depending on the scale of your operations. But a Cloud architecture expert can help you design a hybrid solution that fuses the locality of Private Cloud with the cost-effectiveness of a Public Cloud solution.


And that brings us onto costs…

Spiralling costs

As much as 70% of Cloud costs are wasted.


Companies navigating the Cloud alone often fail to establish true needs, and this results in wasted opportunity and mounting costs. Cloud is complex, and fear of loss is often wildly overcompensated for.


But Cloud is also highly scalable, agile, and cost-effective when done right. 

A well designed architecture that maximises efficiency can perform exceptionally at minimal cost. It just requires an expert hand – someone who knows how to build reliable, scalable Cloud solutions.

Overcoming Cloud migration risks

Slow adoption and a phased Cloud migration are key to success, and the long-term outcomes for Cloud-based businesses are positive in every way, if it’s done right.


But going slow doesn’t mean putting it off; Atlassian Server is now at end of life, with support ending in February 2024. To phase in and manage your Cloud migration effectively, the time to act is now.

Migrating to the Cloud requires strategy, planning and expert knowledge to overcome the risks associated with it. The best way to reduce the risks of a Cloud migration is to find a trusted Cloud Migration Consultant who has the experience and knowledge to facilitate your move into the Cloud.


That’s always been the case, and always will be. And if you need someone on your side to help – we’re here for you.

Bring a Cloud Migration Consultant into your company

Need someone to help you realise your Cloud vision – with zero downtime, and the lowest possible risk?


Hire a world-class Cloud Migration Consultant through ClearHub, to audit and roadmap your way to success. Everyone in the ClearHub network is vetted, skills-checked and ready to go from day one.

We support all our clients and their Cloud Migration Consultants while they’re on the job, too. Your Cloud Migration expert will have access to our support team, a global network of the tech world’s brightest talent, and a comprehensive knowledge-base.

With ClearHub on your side, there’s no Cloud migration challenge you can’t tackle. Get in touch today:

UK contact: Aaron Rowsell

Global Contractor Manager

Email: arowsell@clearhub.tech 

Call: +44 2381 157 811

US contact: David Runyon

Global Contractor Manager

Email: drunyon@clearhub.tech

Call +1 858 304 1215

 

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Is the Cloud good for the environment?

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Tom Joyce

Tom Joyce

Is the Cloud good for the environment?

If you upgrade your phone every year or two, you’re not alone. If your company regularly renews tech contracts and gives you the latest laptop to take home – and if you’re lucky enough to drive an electric car – well, good for you! But there’s a catch.

And it’s huge.

Laptops, phones and electric cars need batteries. Extracting the lithium and other rare metals required to make those batteries is resource intensive. Sometimes dangerous. Lithium battery production in Chile uses 65% of the region’s water supply. Cobalt, a toxic and difficult to manage metal, can only be found in any meaningful quantity in one country.

But computers don’t just take resources to manufacture – they consume vast amounts of power over their lifetime. And when we’re finished with them, our old phones and laptops (and soon enough, electric cars) produce mountains of e-waste.

Basically, our obsession with the latest and greatest technology is not doing the environment any favours – and this is just at a personal level.

All of these problems are magnified to extremes in business.

Your workstation computer, running for 8 hours a day, might use something like 190 kWh of electricity per year. Across your whole company, in every territory, each workstation added up will make for a significant amount of energy consumed. And if your company buildings also house server rooms, running 24/7, with multiple redundancies and cooling systems? Well, let’s just say you’ll be very happy not to be paying the electric bills.

But if Cloud solutions run on data centres, which are responsible for at least 12% of UK electricity consumption, how can migrating to Cloud be better for the environment?

The answer comes in a long-term outlook.

Cloud green credentials: renewable energy

Amazon’s AWS has pledged to run on 100% renewable energy by 2025, with heavy investment in solar and wind. And, while efforts have stalled with the pandemic, this target is still in sight.

That’s significant because AWS is the world’s largest and most trusted Cloud platform. If the leader in Cloud solutions makes the leap to greener power production, then it becomes the benchmark that others must meet.

But even without renewables, Cloud computing inherently has an advantage: it’s simply more efficient. By sharing services and maximising resources in a dedicated purpose-built environment, Cloud data centres use less energy for lighting, cooling and power conditioning – making for real-world energy savings.

Moving shared apps and tasks into the Cloud could use up to 87% less energy than individually hosting and running apps locally. If all businesses around the world consolidated their computing into Cloud centres, efficiency would be completely maximised.

All of this offsets your business power usage and means that, by investing in Cloud, you’re also investing in renewable energy as a long-term solution. This has financial benefits, of course – but it’s also a question of sustainability. Without a long-term, sustainable outlook, there’s no more planet to do business with.

And it’s time to take that claim seriously.

Other environmental benefits of migrating to Cloud

  1. A drastic reduction in hardware turnover

One of the key environmental improvements Cloud can offer is in extending the working life of hardware. Cloud services, running with ultra-low latencies of ~1ms, require little more than a device with a good internet connection to run the latest software ( be that virtually, in a web browser or as a web app). Because the heavy lifting is done in the Cloud, the device becomes little more than a portal into the Cloud.

This means that even ageing (10 years old or more) hardware is just as productive as brand new hardware in Cloud-enabled work environments. 

The result? Fewer hardware purchases. Fewer materials mined, manufactured and shipped around the world. Smaller carbon footprints, chemical footprints and less pollution – and far, far less e-waste.

Of course, data centres are regularly upgraded to best-in-class hardware; but this happens on a far smaller scale than i every business in the world regularly renewing their hardware.

  1. A truly paperless office

The Cloud has facilitated a truly paperless office, in ways that email and local file storage never could. Paper will never be obsolete – but Google Drive, Dropbox and other Cloud storage platforms have made documents handling much more efficient, without having to fell a single tree.

Go green. Migrate to the Cloud – with an expert in your team

ClearHub specialises in finding the best Atlassian Cloud migration contractors, to equip your business for a greener future. Want to know more? Get in touch with the ClearHub team today – call +44 (0) 2381 157811 or send your message to info@clearhub.tech.

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Migrating to the Cloud: clearing up the top concerns

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Tom Joyce

Tom Joyce

Migrating to the Cloud: clearing up the top concerns

Atlassian says that 95% of new customers choose Atlassian Cloud. That’s a pretty convincing statistic – and proves that Cloud isn’t the future: it’s now.

But many organisations are still hesitating to migrate to the Cloud. Cost concerns, security implications, downtime and compromised data integrity – there’s so much to worry about. Except, there’s really nothing to worry about at all, if you have the right Cloud migration strategy in place.

The top Cloud concerns of businesses that rely on their IT infrastructure to operate are totally valid. In the past, as Cloud platforms were maturing, there were definitely issues. But consumer, business and private Cloud platforms have really come of age now; there are rarely any horror stories of data breaches, corruption, downtime or catastrophic failure. And if there are, they’re almost certainly down to human error, and not the platform itself.

So let’s look at the top concerns of migrating to the Cloud – and see if we can clear them up.

1. Cloud security concerns

Security remains the number one cause for concern among businesses yet to adopt Cloud. But this isn’t a Cloud problem – it’s more of a training and compliance issue. 95% of security breaches are attributed to human error, not a weakness in the platform.

Atlassian has a solution; rather than relying on people to never make mistakes (that’s never going to happen!), Atlassian Cloud’s Enterprise plan enables two-factor authentication and Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML), with single sign-on through Atlassian Access. Leaks and breaches can’t happen without some serious thought and effort – and if they do, they’ll be immediately traceable.

Atlassian Cloud is monitored with enterprise-level security – so your IT team no longer has to monitor and patch up any holes in security: it’s all done centrally, monitored and updated 24/7/365, by Atlassian’s team of cybersecurity professionals.

Security is now a non-issue – and in fact, Cloud security and resilience is now far better than that of on-site server rooms, to the point of their redundancy. If security really is a concern, then Cloud is the best possible solution.

2. Managing Cloud is going to take forever!

Some admins might be concerned about the time it’ll take to manage everything. Setting up, allocating resources, access and permissions… It’s going to take forever to move everything over. Right?

It’s a fair concern, too. Nobody wants to be endlessly setting up and not getting any work done. But a unified Cloud platform will actually make everything easier.

With centralised controls, admins have full visibility and control over the tools in use across the business. It’s super simple and straightforward, and there’s far less to go wrong.

Atlassian Cloud’s admin console (available in the Enterprise plan) gives an overview of all the Atlassian products in use – allowing admins to set up multiple instances. Admins get full control of who has access to what: the entire organisation or just select teams?

There’s no limit to how many instances can be set up, and permissions can be managed down to the individual level or across teams. 

And this feeds right back into security. Admins know exactly what’s happening, and who can see what. Alerts can be triggered when certain areas are accessed (even when permissions are granted), and a full picture of access management across the organisation can be gained through clear yet detailed logging and reporting.

3. Cloud is expensive

Monthly costs certainly look higher for Cloud subscriptions and licenses. And not owning the software (or hardware, even) is a real negative for some. But let’s face it: hardware becomes obsolete before you know it, and even a state-of-the-art server room is dead weight within 5 years. And as for software, advances and upgrades come in thick and fast – so even if you own a license, it’s only on the version you’ve purchased.

If you plan on staying in business for the long haul, it makes sense to go down the most cost-effective route in the long-term.

And with Cloud, IT professionals report average savings of 20% post-migration.

That’s game-changing money that can be invested in your people, your product, your business – especially when your IT infrastructure is the core of what you do.

Cloud is unique in that, as a virtual service, it’s completely scalable. You get what you need, maybe with a little headroom, and maintain total efficiency as a result. There’s nothing wasted. All the apps you need are upgraded to the latest version, without having to buy new licenses. The hardware you run on is maintained, upgraded and scaled as you need – and is far more capable and resilient than anything you could achieve in-house.

And this is at a reduced overall cost.

4. Downtime concerns

Cloud resilience, especially in private Cloud configurations, is exceptional. So good, in fact, Atlassian guarantees 99.95% uptime across its Enterprise Cloud products.That’s because Cloud data centres are purpose-built, endlessly monitored and maintained, and made with best-in-class equipment. There’s on-site security, digital security and double-redundant, uninterrupted power supplies (with backup generators should the worst happen). Automated, fully compliant off-site backups can be made, up to hourly in some configurations. And network access is lightning-fast, with double redundancy built-in, for most private Cloud setups.

 

If your server room could match that, you’d be selling private Cloud services!

In terms of downtime or data loss during migration, this can be mitigated with a Cloud migration strategy. By phasing the crossover from legacy to Cloud, implementing virtual machines and using rock-solid backup and archiving, the risks are lowered significantly, with the absolute worst case being a momentary roll back.

With an Atlassian Cloud migration expert on hand, you’ll have the knowledge you need to take the stress out of Cloud migration – and alleviate all your concerns.

Hire a Cloud migration expert

ClearHub specialises in finding the best Atlassian Cloud migration contractors, to make migrating to the Cloud seamless and low-risk. Want to know more? Get in touch with the ClearHub team today – call +44 (0) 2381 157811 or send your message to info@clearhub.tech.

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How Cloud is future proofing teams

How Cloud is future proofing teams
How Cloud is future proofing teams
Evie Jenkins

Evie Jenkins

How Cloud is future proofing teams

Cloud adoption is higher than ever.

94% of enterprises already use Cloud solutions in some capacity. Covid-19 accelerated adoption to rates nobody could have imagined, but those who’ve adopted it only recently are in no hurry to go back. That’s because the future is unequivocally in the Cloud.

It’s not just working remotely in the Cloud anymore. It’s everything. Teams are future proof, more resilient and better connected than ever before – even when working in the office – thanks to the Cloud.

Let’s explain further.

Cloud is collaborative

Cloud applications – like Confluence Cloud, Jira Cloud and other Atlassian Cloud tools – are inherently collaborative. They were built to share knowledge and progress between multiple users, from the bottom up. Collaboration isn’t an afterthought with cloud, like it is on locally-stored solutions; version tracking and commenting can get really, really messy in some pieces of software (we all know who the main offenders are).

But that all disappears with Cloud. Everyone can see what’s going on in a project, what the latest version is and gets updated when it matters. It’s collaboration done exactly right, and that’s what the teams of the future will need.

Cloud is bleeding edge

You upgrade your phone every couple of years, right? So why not your work software?

Well, Cloud apps do this all the time – in fact, they’re continuously, relentlessly being improved and updated, right under your nose. You always have the latest version whenever you log in, without having to install or restart, or download anything.

And as for hardware? That’s not a central resource anymore. No more major investments in storage, maintenance, power and cooling – it’s all handled by a specialist Cloud provider. You don’t have to have the latest piece of tech in-house anymore; last-gen tech can comfortably run your Cloud apps, and it’ll keep going until the next tech revolution.

Regardless of your IT infrastructure level, Cloud will just work; now, and in the future.

Cloud is affordable

Because you don’t own any hardware and subscribe to a service for your apps, your financial risks are lower.

Yes, you have less collateral – but consider this: a functional data centre, even one for a small business, can cost millions over its lifetime, only to become obsolete and worthless in the end. That’s hardly an investment.

You constantly have to maintain it. You have to power it, cool it, and hire an endless stream of IT professionals to take care of it. It’s like having a 200 terawatt-hour baby.

At the rate at which technology moves, obsolescence is becoming more regular. Because of this, Cloud solutions are relatively cheap, and moving to the latest platform is far less risky. Cloud adopters benefit from limitless scaling as well as upgradability, plus the option to host legacy apps in virtual machines.

There’s no way to lose.

Cloud is resilient

The tech that runs the Cloud is tough. In fact, Private Cloud and purpose-built data centres are built with double redundant mains power, uninterrupted power supplies and off-grid generators running on 24 hour refuelling contracts. They have multiple backup connections via cable, satellite and mobile data – and are cooled and maintained around the clock. Security on-site ensures no unauthorised entry, and dedicated maintenance teams keep everything running at all hours, with total user support. Add hourly backups to the mix, and you’ve got a solution that’s bulletproof.

No internal server room couldn’t possibly match the resilience of a Cloud solution.

Cloud is simple

Non-technical people all know their way around Cloud apps, because they’re simple and intuitive. But more than that, Cloud frees your technical teams to focus on high-value projects.

Cloud apps are self-regulating and self-maintaining, which means no more IT tickets to your internal team for simple changes. Reducing backlogs in IT is only half the story, though – your business and non-technical teams no longer have to wait to get on with their work.

We haven’t even touched on one of the biggest productivity boosters yet – the one feature of the future that’ll make all the difference: automation.

Your business teams can automate simple, routine tasks and give themselves more time to work on what’s important. And, with automated security updates and scaling, your IT teams won’t have to worry about installing new racks or patching. It’s all done automatically.

Isn’t it time you reached for the Cloud? We can help you migrate your systems, with an expert in your own team – to future proof your whole business.

Get into the Cloud – with an expert in your team

ClearHub specialises in finding the best Atlassian Cloud migration contractors, to equip your business for the future. Want to know more? Get in touch with the ClearHub team today – call +44 (0) 2381 157811 or send your message to info@clearhub.tech.

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Productivity has massively improved – thanks to the Cloud

DO MORE
DO MORE
Tom Joyce

Tom Joyce

Productivity has massively improved – thanks to the Cloud

A two-year study by Stanford University has confirmed what many already knew: working from home is a productivity booster. What has been less understood is how Cloud has facilitated productivity across WFH and office teams – until now. It’s clear that the key driver and facilitator of improved WFH is the adoption of Cloud apps and infrastructure, but how are Cloud platforms responsible for increased productivity?

In a 2015 report by Microsoft Office 365, Cloud apps were expected to be adopted by 78% of enterprise businesses by 2020. Coronavirus accelerated matters significantly, and now, we live in a truly remote, Cloud-based age of work. Cloud, even in office-based teams, is still able to provide substantial, noticeable productivity gains. Find out how.

IT solutions, simplified

Software tools are one thing – the hardware to run them on is another. Even if you’re computing locally on the latest hardware, you still need somewhere to store all the data you produce. In large organisations, huge scores of data can be generated in a day. Traditionally, storage and archiving (possibly some form of computing and virtualisation, too) was achieved with on-site servers.

Anyone who’s run a server room at a company building (especially one that wasn’t designed to house one) knows how complex they are, how fragile they can be, and how much maintenance they require. Anyone who’s relied on an internal IT infrastructure like this knows how damaging it can be when it goes wrong.

Cloud solutions all but eliminate the hardware, maintenance and frustration of an internal IT infrastructure. By offloading resources to a private Cloud, dedicated hardware running at precise specifications can be procured – managed by an external team whole only job is to keep your Cloud apps running.

This frees your IT team and company resources to focus on high-value tasks, with a boon to productivity. But freeing your IT teams is only the start.

Business teams benefit, too

Cloud apps offer productivity benefits for every team in your business, including Finance and HR, Sales, Marketing – you name it. If there’s work to be done on a computer, Cloud tools can do it better than locally installed software. Here’s why: automation.

Automating workflows and basic tasks frees time and mental pressure from your teams. The result? Happier, more engaged employees, with more time to do what matters in their roles. This is hugely important, and not only for productivity. Satisfaction with work, higher engagement and using your skills to make a difference all add up to a strong workforce and reduced attrition.

That’s not all, though. Cloud apps have the advantage of instant upgrades, usually made at regular intervals. This unlocks more power within the tools your team uses – without additional complexity. That’s because upgrades are usually small and incremental, easing users into new designs or layouts, instead of benign transformational and requiring more training to use.

Think of it this way: when the iPhone launched with iOS installed, it was totally revolutionary. Easy to use, by anyone. Fast forward to today and the capabilities of the platform are lightyears ahead – almost unrecognisable. But each year, the platform updated just a little bit. Small tweaks here and there, occasional redesigns – and a swathe of creeping improvements behind the scenes.

Nobody had to relearn anything – it all just worked. But the capability of the platform has exploded, giving users the power to do more than ever before.

Cloud apps, with their incremental upgrades, work in the same way; they remain intuitive to people who’ve already invested in them, while unlocking even more functionality.

Cloud for collaboration? Remoters, rejoice

Remote isn’t the future – it’s now. And Cloud has levelled performance and accessibility around the world. Whether your teams work in a single office, at global sites or at home, Cloud is a breakthrough for collaboration. Every study we’ve read agrees – and so do the most prominent leaders in business. Collaboration is rocket fuel for high performers – but even when working in the same building, collaboration in software over multiple pieces of hardware is tricky.

With local storage and in-house servers, documents are more than often siloed. Transparency is non-existent. Copies of copies are generated, versions are difficult to track, and sometimes, work gets duplicated many times over. It’s wasteful and frustrating.

But Cloud was made for collaboration.

In Cloud apps, everyone can work at the same time, in real time. Version tracking is simple, with no need for duplication. And transparency runs from the top of the company down.

Anyone can search for files they need, provided they have the right access level. They can always request permission if they don’t – but final control on what’s visible can be set by management.

And therein lies the power of Cloud; your teams can do more, with fewer resources, in less time. Isn’t it time you joined the Cloud, too?

Perform a Cloud migration – with an expert in your team

ClearHub specialises in finding the best Atlassian Cloud migration contractors, to equip your business for hybrid and remote working – and the next stage of your growth. We have access to the world’s most admired Cloud migration contractors.

Want to know more? Get in touch with the ClearHub team today – call +44 (0) 2381 157811 or send your message to info@clearhub.tech.