The company’s in-house IT team did not have the public cloud skills to support a cloud transition. In addition, it did not have a digital strategy for its data and did not want to expose itself to any uncertainties in moving to the cloud.
Because of our long-standing relationship, the firm approached Orange Business to help with its cloud migration. It engaged the Orange professional services team to manage the end-to-end cloud transition using proven methodologies and references.
The equity firm recognized the extensive experience of Orange in the cloud arena, including architecting, building, deploying and managing public clouds and associated services. Through our large network footprint and end‐to‐end support, the company was confident that Orange could deliver the performance and reliability it needed alongside continuity and resilience.
Orange is a trusted player in digital transformation, acting on the entire data value chain. This was key in developing a data strategy for the company that would allow for more intelligent insights and help it achieve its agile business goals.
Mapping the move to cloud
Through our consultancy services, we put together a cloud strategy that addressed this customer's need for scalability, flexibility and security. We also designed the cloud architecture and performed the implementation using the Microsoft Azure platform.
The firm was already using Microsoft Office 365, and 90% of its virtual machines (VMs) were Windows based. This made Microsoft Azure an ideal platform for its business needs.
The company now has access to Azure’s entire service catalog via Orange, which includes leveraging monitoring, log, analytics and back-up services. This approach significantly reduces operating costs versus using proprietary tooling.
Going forward, the company will self-manage its cloud platform and security. Orange is continuing to provide operational support.
Savings in the cloud
Savings have already been realized, and when this equity firm decommissions its data center, costs will be pared down still further. Management has also been easier. Migrating to cloud-based firewalls for security, for example, has been more straightforward.