How to manage costs during large-scale migrations with AWS
Migrating large-scale systems to the cloud is a complex process with numerous challenges. One of the most critical is effective cost management. To ensure that the migration is cost-effective and successful, it is crucial to have a solid strategy that addresses both technical planning and execution, as well as rigorous financial control throughout the process. This management not only impacts the project budget, but can also influence the long-term viability of the migrated infrastructure.
Three keys to manage migration costs with AWS
1. Define success metrics
In the initial phase of the migration, it is crucial to assess the current needs of your organization and establish the key metrics that will guide the entire process. Defining how these metrics will be measured ensures constant control and helps keep the project on track. The AWS Cloud Value Framework (CVF) suggests focusing these metrics on four main aspects for your business:
- Cost and Productivity: Evaluates the percentage of IT infrastructure spend relative to annual revenue, the cost per user or transaction, and the number of VMs/TBs managed per administrator.
- Overall performance: Measures the percentage of programs that achieved the estimated ROI, the hours required to prepare IT resources, and the average level of customer and employee satisfaction.
- Resiliency and security: Analyzes critical application availability, unplanned downtime, and average time to detect and resolve incidents.
- Business agility: Reviews the average time to market, the number of releases to production without problems, and the average number of new deployments performed.
Identifying the most relevant metrics from the outset provides a solid foundation for evaluating the success of your migration, establishing a defensible plan, and aligning efforts with your organization’s strategic objectives.
2. Improve cost visibility and predictability
During the mobilization phase of a large-scale migration, it is critical to have the right cost management environment in place. To improve visibility and predictability of spend, you can leverage the AWS Well-Architected Program, which allows for a structured assessment of your workloads, ensuring they are optimized in terms of cost, performance, reliability and efficiency. This program is key to ensuring that the decisions made are aligned with AWS best practices.
In addition, the Migration Acceleration Program (MAP) offers funding for organizations migrating to AWS, as well as requiring proper workload tagging. Properly tagging resources will help you organize and track costs more accurately, allowing you to define a comprehensive strategy for cost allocation and closely monitor the progress of application migration.
Collaborating with your finance teams is also essential to turn the business case into a detailed budget plan using AWS Budgets. This will allow you to keep data accessible through customized dashboards, documenting cost variances and adjusting forecasts according to new migration waves.
3. Optimize resources to maximize savings and performance
Evaluating resource utilization and optimizing costs prior to migrating your systems and applications is critical at this point. Use the information gathered during the assessment phase to right-size resources from the start and make sure you use the most cost and performance efficient options for each type of resource.
To take full advantage of AWS capabilities, your organization will need to modernize applications. Consider AWS managed database options such as RDS, Aurora, Redshift and DynamoDB to maximize performance. If the process is complex or there are time constraints, you may opt for a “lift and shift” approach, but it is important to establish a clear plan with your organization to modernize afterwards.
Managing costs during a large-scale migration requires not only meticulous planning and constant monitoring, but also the ability to adapt to changing circumstances. By following these practices, you can manage costs more effectively and ensure a smoother, more cost-effective transition. Efficient cost management not only ensures project success, but also strengthens your organization’s long-term financial position, allowing the technology infrastructure to evolve in a sustainable manner.
Optimize your migration with Altostratus: Your expert partner in cost control
At Altostratus, we specialize in managing the end-to-end process of migrating and managing infrastructure to the cloud, tailoring each step to the specific needs of your organization. We start with a comprehensive assessment that allows us to design customized strategies to ensure a smooth transition and optimal resource management. Our approach focuses on optimizing infrastructure to improve operational efficiency, scalability and cost control, while ensuring uninterrupted uptime.
In addition, we offer comprehensive support to your teams throughout the process, providing ongoing support and specialized training to ensure that your staff is trained to effectively manage the new infrastructure.
Are you ready to take your IT migration to the next level? Contact us and find out how we can help you manage your costs efficiently and securely.
