Professional services
Cloud services, including the honest question of whether to move
Migration, modernisation and management across Azure and AWS — starting with whether moving actually helps, because lifting a system unchanged into the cloud usually costs more.
The situation
Cloud is not automatically cheaper
A system moved without being changed usually runs at the same shape and a higher price. The saving comes from the changes made along the way, not from the destination.
- A cloud bill that keeps growing without anyone owning it
- Servers running around the clock for work that happens in office hours
- Hardware approaching end of life with a refresh decision due
- Environments created for a project and never switched off
- No clear picture of what is running or who asked for it
- A migration that moved the servers and none of the problems
What it covers
What cloud work covers
Assessment
What you run, what it costs today, and what each option would actually cost in the cloud — including staying where you are.
Migration
Moving workloads with a tested plan and a way back, rather than a weekend and optimism.
Modernisation
Changing how a system runs so it can use what the cloud is good at, which is where the saving usually comes from.
Cost management
Right-sizing, scheduling and reservations, plus visibility of who is spending what.
Security and governance
Identity, network design, encryption and guardrails so the estate does not sprawl.
Resilience
Backup, recovery and failover designed to a stated objective and then actually tested.
How we work
How cloud work runs
Assess
Establish the real current cost and what each workload would cost moved, modernised, or left alone.
Decide per workload
Not everything should move, and not everything should move the same way. A blanket decision is how cloud bills get out of hand.
Migrate and modernise
Move in stages, changing what needs changing so the workload can actually benefit from where it now runs.
Optimise and govern
Right-size after real usage data arrives, and put controls in place so cost and sprawl stay visible.
Outcomes
What you are left with
- A decision per workload rather than one blanket migration
- Costs understood before the move rather than discovered after
- Capacity that follows demand instead of running flat out
- Recovery objectives stated and tested rather than assumed
- Visibility of what is running and who asked for it
- No hardware refresh cycle to plan around
Platforms and tooling
What we work with
Platforms
- Microsoft Azure
- AWS
- Hybrid
- Private cloud
Delivery
- Docker
- Kubernetes
- Terraform
- Bicep
- CI/CD
Operations
- Monitoring
- Backup and DR
- Identity
- Cost management
Named as platforms we work with, not as formal partnerships.
Common questions
Questions we are usually asked
Not by itself. Lifting a system unchanged usually costs more, because you are renting capacity sized for a peak that runs all day. Savings come from modernising how the workload runs — scaling down out of hours, using managed services, retiring what nobody uses.
No, and deciding per workload is most of the value in the assessment. Some systems are cheaper where they are, some cannot move for data residency or licensing reasons, and some should be retired rather than migrated anywhere.
Usually, and often substantially. The common causes are consistent: environments nobody switched off, instances sized for a launch-day peak that never recurred, and storage tiers left at the default. Fixing them needs visibility first, which is generally what is missing.
Both are capable of running almost anything you need. The decision usually turns on your existing licensing, what your team already knows, and which managed services you actually intend to use — not on a feature comparison.
The platforms are generally more secure than most on-premise server rooms. Most cloud breaches come from configuration rather than the platform — public storage, over-permissive identity, missing network controls — which is why governance is part of the work rather than an afterthought.
It can usually be kept short with parallel running and a planned switch, though that costs more. For many workloads a scheduled outage is cheaper and safer, and we will tell you which we think applies rather than defaulting to the more expensive option.
Talk to someone who has built this
Not a salesperson working from a form. Tell us what the problem looks like and someone who has delivered this kind of work will come back to you, usually within one working day.
Book a free consultationRelated
Where this usually connects
- HostingManaged hosting for the systems we build and the ones you already run.
- Legacy modernisationFor the system nobody wants to touch but everything depends on.
- Data migrationMoving data between systems without losing its history.
- Mainframe modernisationMoving off hardware and languages that are getting hard to staff.
- Agile and DevOpsShorter release cycles and a build pipeline you can rely on.
- Application development and maintenanceBuilding it, then keeping it running and current.