IT organizations should deliver services at speed the business demands, which has increased the need for cloud adoption services. Further, agility and scalability, better customer experience, and the demand for modernizing legacy systems have increased the need for application modernization services worldwide.
Generally, organizations have two major application types:
- Need-to-work applications that help get work done, such as collaboration or email tools
- Need-to-win applications are the revenue generators and mission-critical applications
In the phase of business that requires short development cycles, faster deployment, AI/ML-powered analytics, and better customer experience, application modernization is a must for any organization.
The Need for the Application Modernization Path Now
Modernization is transforming the applications to run on or off-premises, whichever is the best place to run the applications. Many leading companies identified that as businesses evolve, requirements for the applications evolve, which may alter the placement of applications between today and tomorrow. Maintaining two different infrastructures can be tedious at the same time costly. Application modernization has eliminated this issue by transforming applications to gain greater agility in the entire lifecycle, architecture, and deployment options.
Application Modernization Paradox
Though many IT organizations have plans to embark on application modernization projects, they fear the longevity of the projects and vendor lock-in. Moreover, they will be forced to choose a single cloud or container vendor, which may trigger unplanned price hikes down the road.
At the same time, applications in large enterprises live in silos, and modernizing specific versions of legacy applications like Siebel, PeopleSoft, Oracle, SAP, etc., can be challenging as they were designed as single, unbreakable monoliths.
Eventually, managing a portfolio of diverse applications can be challenging for the IT team because the tools that drive these applications are either infrastructure-specific (e.g., VMware, CloudFormation, etc.) or application-specific (e.g., SAP Landscape Management).
All these reasons sum up resulting in
- managing multiple vendor contracts with different pricing and terms
- IT operations team need to master all the tools being used
Therefore, organizations must think of a cohesive application delivery process.
Quick Techniques for Successful Application Modernization
To overcome the challenges mentioned above in application modernization, I’ve listed a few techniques that will help you seamlessly modernize your applications in quick turnarounds.
1. Goal-setting for application modernization
It’s highly critical to plan your application modernization process and set objectives to ensure what you are trying to achieve. Because this goal-setting would define the
- total length of the project
- cost involved
- workforce required and
- risks that would encounter
Soon after that, the implementation route and the urgency/complexity of a project should be defined to tell you which application modernization technique best fits your business needs.
2. Inventory your apps
Determine which apps should move to the cloud and compile a list.
For example, consider modernizing and integrating an inventory application into an e-commerce system that monitors the stock statuses and makes product recommendations accordingly, boosting customer experience and retention rates.
3. Assess app characteristics
You should list out the characteristics, requirements, and usage of your apps. Make a note for each app:
- is it mission-critical?
- how often it’s used, and what requirements it meets?
- how it’s architected at present (monolithic, tightly-coupled, loosely-coupled, decoupled, etc.)?
- are there any data compliance, sensitivity, privacy, or integrity issues?
- does it require scalability?
- what are the resources currently required to run it (network, storage, CPU, and memory)?
4. Assess cloud-suited apps
Compile a list of apps that are better suited to the cloud and require very little or no modifications to move there. They may include:
- cloud-native apps
- apps built using microservices or service-oriented architecture (SOA)
- apps utilized by mobile employees
- apps that require significant computing resources but infrequently run, etc.
5. Eliminate application dependencies
Reach out to different departments to identify critical apps that you may not be aware of due to shadow IT and map their interdependencies with your other business services or applications.
When it comes to application modernization, everything must be abstracted and relieved of dependencies with the underlying architecture. Without changing a line of code, you can abstract your application’s functions (that can run anywhere) into modules and move them to modern infrastructure.
Get more done with Application Modernization
There are various approaches to application modernization, starting from modernizing only critical applications to revamping the whole architecture and infrastructure. However, that depends on the problem you would want to eliminate from your existing business process.
Today, organizations are keenly focusing on legacy applications modernization to stay in line with the changing business needs and customer preferences.
A successful application modernization project should enable organizations to
- run and test applications in a virtual environment and
- manage applications at an individual component level
Why PreludeSys?
PreludeSys being a trusted Microsoft Gold Partner has successfully implemented value-adding, business-transforming solutions to clients across various industries like software, finance, retail, healthcare, etc. Our engagement starts from enterprise assessment to delivering technology solutions, with innovation and scalability as top of mind. We have an enviable track record of 100% timely delivery and 24×7 support.
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