Cloud and Azure services for organisations moving off their own servers
The cloud is not cheaper by default. It is cheaper when it is sized, and more expensive when it is not.
Logic Networks moves organisations across London and the rest of the UK onto cloud services, and then keeps the result in order. That covers Microsoft Azure, cloud file storage, cloud backup and remote access to the applications your team needs.
Most of the work we are asked for starts with a server that is coming to the end of its life. The choice at that point is a new box in a cupboard or a move, and the right answer depends on what the server does rather than on the fashion.
We will tell you when staying on your own equipment is the sensible option. That happens more often than the industry admits.
A cloud bill grows quietly and never shrinks on its own.
Machines left running overnight, storage nobody deletes, a test system from two years ago. Reviewing the bill is part of the work, not an extra service.
- Sized to what you use, not to what the old server had
- Your own subscription, in your own name
- Costs reviewed monthly, with the items named
- A written record of what runs where and why
What is included
Six pieces of work, from the first assessment to the monthly bill.
You are unlikely to need all six at once. A move usually starts with the first two and adds the rest over the following year.
Assessment and the honest recommendation
Including when not to move.
We look at each server and each application and say where it should live: moved as it is, replaced by a cloud service, or left where it is for now.
Two things decide it. Whether the application will run properly away from your building, and whether your internet connection can carry the traffic once the system is no longer down the corridor. Both are checked before anything is quoted.
Microsoft Azure
Built to a plan, not grown by accident.
Virtual machines, storage, networking and the identity that ties them to your Microsoft 365 accounts, set up in your own subscription so it remains yours.
We size machines for what they actually do, turn off what does not need to run at night, and write down what each piece is for. An Azure environment nobody can explain is the most common reason a bill doubles.
Migration off your own servers
One weekend, planned backwards.
Moving file servers, applications and databases, with the cutover scheduled outside working hours and tested with a small group first.
The old equipment stays available for a short period afterwards rather than being switched off on the day, so there is somewhere to go back to if a detail was missed.
Remote access to applications
The same desktop from anywhere.
Where an application has to run on Windows and cannot move to a browser, we publish it so people reach it from home or from another office without a virtual private network to their old server.
This is often the piece that makes hybrid working work properly for organisations with one important application that was written a long time ago.
Cloud backup and recovery
A copy somewhere the attack cannot reach.
Backups held in the cloud and, importantly, held where your normal accounts cannot delete them. A restore is run as a test and the date is recorded.
Moving to the cloud does not remove the need for this. A cloud file service copies your mistakes as faithfully as your work. See backup and disaster recovery.
Cost management
A bill you can read.
A monthly look at what you are paying for and what it is doing. Machines resized, unused storage removed, and committed pricing used where a system will clearly run for a year or more.
The saving usually comes from the boring end: things left running, and storage nobody owns. We name each item rather than reporting a percentage.
How it works
Three arrangements, and the first one is where nearly everybody starts.
The assessment is deliberately separate from the move. You should be able to read the recommendation, including the option of doing nothing, without having committed to anything.
Tell us what is coming to the end of its life and we will say which of the three we would suggest.
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An assessment
Each server and application reviewed, with a recommendation, a cost for moving and a cost for staying. Yours to act on however you choose.
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A migration project
Defined scope, a cutover date and a rollback plan. Finished and handed over with documentation.
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Managed cloud
The environment run for you as part of managed IT: patching, monitoring, backup and the monthly cost review.
Who it is for
The trigger is almost always physical. A server approaching the end of its support, an office move, a lease ending, or a building that can no longer be relied on for power and cooling.
The second trigger is people. Once a team works from more than one place, systems that only exist in one building become the thing everybody complains about.
- Businesses with a server that is due for replacement
- Charities and non profits who would rather not own hardware at all
- Education organisations needing access for staff off site
- Organisations moving office, where the cupboard is not coming with them
- Teams with one old application that everybody has to reach
- Anyone whose cloud bill has grown and nobody can say why
What we need from you
Three things, and the first one decides the whole plan.
A migration is only as good as the list it was planned from. Where something is missing, tell us early rather than at the cutover.
A list of your applications
What each one does, who supplies it and who depends on it. The one nobody remembered is always the one that stops the cutover at two in the morning.
Access and ownership
Administrator access to the servers and the domain, and your own name on the cloud subscription. A subscription in a supplier’s name is difficult to move later.
A quiet weekend, agreed early
Cutovers happen outside working hours. Picking the date around your own busy periods rather than ours is what keeps the move uneventful.
What we usually find in an assessment
These come up in most organisations still running their own equipment, and each one changes the plan.
- One server doing four unrelated jobs, all of which have to move together
- An application whose supplier no longer exists or no longer supports it
- An internet connection that will not carry the traffic once the files are remote
- A licence that cannot legally be moved to cloud hardware without being rebought
- Storage that has grown to several times what is actually in use
- A cloud subscription already open, set up by somebody who has left
- Backups running to a device in the same room as the server
Our steps for working together
A move is planned backwards from the cutover, because the cutover is the only part with a fixed hour. These are the stages.
- Assessment Each server, application and licence reviewed, with the connection tested and a recommendation for each item, including the ones to leave alone.
- A plan with two costs What the move costs once, and what the running cost will be each month. Both, side by side with the cost of staying.
- Build in the background The new environment created and configured while the old one carries on. Nobody in your team notices this part.
- Copy and test Data copied, then a small group works in the new environment for a few days. Every fault found here is one not found by everybody at once.
- Cutover Outside working hours, with the last differences copied and a written rollback if a detail turns out to be wrong.
- Two weeks of cover The old equipment left available, and somebody reachable for the questions that only appear in real use.
- Decommission and review Old hardware wiped and disposed of properly, then the first monthly cost review.
How we set priorities
Anything that stops people working comes first. During a move, the order is mail, then files, then applications, because a person can wait an hour for a document and not for a customer’s message. Any date you have told us about is treated as fixed.
What the monthly review covers
- What each item costs Named individually, not as a single figure.
- What is oversized Machines and storage larger than the work needs, with the saving stated.
- What is unused Anything running that nobody has touched, including test systems.
- What is coming Renewals, committed pricing decisions and anything reaching its end of support.
- What changed So an increase always has a named cause.
Choosing between Azure, Microsoft 365 and leaving it where it is
These three get talked about as one thing and they are not. Knowing which is which removes most of the confusion in a cloud conversation.
- Microsoft 365 replaces a job. Mail, files, meetings and documents stop being something you run and become something you use.
- Azure replaces a machine. Your server still exists, with the same operating system and the same application, but somebody else owns the hardware.
- Your own equipment remains the right answer for a system that must stay in the building, or where an application is licensed to physical hardware.
Most organisations end up with all three. The file server becomes Microsoft 365, the one Windows application moves to Azure, and a small piece of equipment stays on site for the things that have to be local. The point of the assessment is to decide which category each item belongs in, once, and to write it down so the question does not come back every year.
What we will not tell you
We will not tell you the cloud is always cheaper. For a stable system that runs the same workload every day on hardware you already own, it often is not. What it changes is who is responsible when the hardware fails, where the system can be reached from, and whether a replacement is a project or a setting.
What good looks like
You know what runs where and why. Nobody worries about a cupboard. The bill is the same as last month unless somebody asked for a change. And when a machine has to grow, it grows on a Tuesday afternoon rather than in a six week purchase.
Related services
A cloud move touches most of the other work, because what used to be one server usually becomes three separate services.
Where you already have one of these in place, we work with it rather than replacing it.
- Microsoft 365 for mail, files and the accounts that sign in to Azure
- Backup and disaster recovery for the copy you recover from
- Networks and infrastructure for the connection the cloud depends on
- Cybersecurity for the sign in and boundary rules around it
- Projects and consultancy if this is part of an office move
Articles and news on cloud and Azure
Notes on moving off your own servers, sizing and the monthly bill, written without the sales language.
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Read the articleTalk to us about cloud and Azure
Tell us what you are running today and what is coming to the end of its life. We will assess it and come back with the cost of moving, the cost of staying and which we would choose.
No obligation, and no sales call unless you ask for one.