Industry
Retail
Services used
Cloud Migration
Partners used
AWS
cloudEQ Supports a Global Fast-Food Chain in Accelerating a Complex Migration to AWS
Overview
A global leader in the fast-food industry sought to modernize its infrastructure and ensure a more secure, efficient, and scalable environment for its critical business applications. The company faced a directive to close its on-premises data centers within a specified time frame, leading to the migration of all on-premises workloads to the cloud. With a focus on meeting deadlines and maintaining operational continuity, the fast-food chain turned to cloudEQ for a cloud migration strategy leveraging AWS services, with the goal of improving security, operational efficiency, and scalability.
Objective
The primary objective of this migration was to move the fast-food chain’s critical workloads from on-premises infrastructure to the cloud within a tight deadline. The solution had to deliver:
- A secure and scalable environment.
- Seamless migration of production and staging workloads, including Oracle databases.
- An efficient, manageable AWS environment for operational activities.
- Timely and well-coordinated transition to avoid any disruptions to business operations.
Migration Details
The migration involved 90 servers and 17 Amazon RDS (Relational Database Service) instances, spanned three AWS regions to handle both production and staging workloads, and included AWS services like AWS RDS for Oracle 19c, AWS VPC (Virtual Private Cloud), Amazon GuardDuty, Amazon EFS, and Amazon Managed Services (AMS).
All workloads had to either be migrated to the cloud or decommissioned within a set time frame. Although the migration was not driven primarily by cost savings, ensuring that the transition was seamless, efficient, and on schedule was crucial.
Pre-Migration Planning & Discovery
cloudEQ initially utilized the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit (MAPS) to assess the on-premise environment, as the workloads were originally intended for Azure Cloud. However, upon further analysis of the client’s requirements and consultation with the client’s IT team, AWS was chosen as the preferred cloud platform due to its compatibility with their virtual machine (VM) sizing, pricing models, and scalability needs.
A comprehensive analysis of the company’s current VM environment and resource utilization was conducted. This data was used to create a BuildSheet, which was crucial for defining the right AWS instance types and configurations. The AWS pricing model was then calculated to ensure that the solution met the clients needs efficiently.
A PoC was completed in a separate AWS account to test the compatibility of the fast-food chain’s applications with AWS RDS for Oracle 19c, replacing the existing IaaS Oracle database infrastructure. Additionally, the team tested the migration from NFS (used by IBM software) to Amazon Elastic File System (EFS) for shared file storage.
Migration Execution
The migration process followed a structured, well-documented approach that included:
- Design Document: A detailed design document outlining the architecture, migration strategy, and dependencies was created. This document served as the blueprint for the migration process.
- Migration Kick-Off & Planning Sessions: The migration process began with a series of kickoff and planning tabletop sessions, during which the cloudEQ team reviewed the migration steps, identified potential challenges, and aligned with the client’s stakeholders on timelines and resources. These sessions were conducted at regular intervals to ensure smooth coordination.
- Migration Methodology: CloudEQ’s standard migration methodology was followed.
- Design Phase: Defining the architecture, cloud environment, and AWS services to be used.
- Migration Phase: Data migration, server migration, and service testing.
- Post-Migration Phase: Final validation, knowledge transfer (KT), and operational handoff.
- Data Migration with CloudEndure: cloudEQ leveraged CloudEndure was used for server replication and data migration. This tool allowed for minimal downtime and ensured that all critical data was successfully migrated to the new AWS environment.
- RDS Migration & Oracle 19c Setup: cloudEQ then migrated the existing Oracle IaaS databases to AWS RDS instances running Oracle 19c. This change was a significant part of the migration strategy, as it ensured the database was managed and maintained in a more efficient, secure, and scalable cloud environment.
- VPC and Networking Configuration: Custom AWS VPC configurations were deployed manually, including subnets, route tables, and NAT gateways. These VPCs were connected to the production Transit Gateway (TGW) in a separate AWS account to ensure seamless network connectivity.
Post-Migration & Support
After the migration, the AWS environment was managed by Amazon Managed Services (AMS), which provided operational support, including 24×7 monitoring, patch management, security audits, and incident response. AMS used Amazon GuardDuty to identify potential threats, and collaborated with the fast-food chain to remediate findings based on best practices.
AWS Config and conformance packs were used to ensure compliance with industry standards and internal security policies. Conformance packs helped establish governance checks around security, operations, and cost optimization.
cloudEQ facilitated knowledge transfer sessions with the company’s internal teams to ensure they were equipped to manage the new cloud environment effectively. This was a critical part of the post-migration process, as it allowed the client to take ownership of the AWS infrastructure.
Results & Benefits
Migrating to AWS provided the fast-food chain with a more scalable and high-performance environment. The AWS cloud architecture enabled better resource allocation, faster provisioning, and higher availability for critical workloads.
The use of AWS managed services (RDS, EFS, AMS) significantly reduced the operational overhead of managing the infrastructure, allowing the company’s IT teams to focus on strategic initiatives rather than day-to-day infrastructure management.
The integration of AWS security services such as GuardDuty, AMS monitoring, and conformance packs ensured that the client’s environment remained secure and compliant with industry standards.
The migration was completed within the specified time frame, meeting the directive to close the on-premises data centers. This successful migration ensured that the company could continue operations without disruption.
Conclusion
This was a complex and time-sensitive project for the client, but with the support of cloudEQ and AWS, with careful planning, collaboration, and execution, the migration was completed on time and met all objectives. By leveraging AWS services and CloudEQ’s migration expertise, the fast-food chain successfully transitioned to a more efficient, secure, and scalable cloud environment, positioning the company for future growth and innovation.
