One of the most common trends in data strategy is moving to the cloud. More recently, we have been hearing companies say that they’re moving “everything” to the cloud. Unfortunately, this is easier said than done, because some data, or data-related items, might not be able to be hosted in the cloud. However, data virtualization solves this problem, making it possible to achieve all the benefits of a completely cloud-based, unified enterprise data repository while also avoiding the unforeseen pitfalls.
TransAlta Moves to the Cloud while Unifying a Diverse Data Landscape
TransAlta, an energy producer with gas, hydro, solar, wind, and coal facilities across the U.S., Canada, and Australia, leveraged data virtualization with the company’s cloud strategy. A few years ago, TransAlta decided to move 100% of its data to the cloud. The company centralized its data to reduce infrastructure, simplify data access, and scale storage. The biggest hidden challenge many companies face when trying to be completely cloud based is connecting the applications they accumulate over time. Whether they were developed and configured for on-premises environments, have specific security requirements, or are too old and complex to connect to data in the cloud, this presents a challenge.
Additionally, companies often experience increased latency due to the geographical distance between datacenters and applications, both on-premises and in the cloud. For TransAlta, the Denodo Platform created a virtual layer between these data sources, which enabled previously impossible connections and sped up data delivery to near-real-time.
Governance and security are always a huge concern. TransAlta conquered these challenges with a risk mitigation tool that worked in real time, improving the company’s ability to govern and secure its data. Many people assume that centralizing their data will make it less secure, but this example shows how centralization can improve security.
Asurion and his effective use of Cloud Modernization and Data Virtualization
Another example of cloud modernization is Asurion, a large insurance company based in Nashville. When they required next-generation technologies like predictive analytics and IoT capabilities their legacy architecture could not support them. They also were facing rigorous security requirements from the government. They used data virtualization to migrate everything they could to the cloud, some legacy systems simply could not be moved, and then deployed data virtualization both on the cloud and on-premise to create a hybrid data layer. This enabled their next-generation technologies with faster data discovery as well as role based access control and granular usage across all their systems.
Exadata and Data Virtualization as a solution to Logitech problems
One last example is Logitech, a Swiss global provider of personal computer and tablet accessories. Their scalability and performance issues required them to make a changed from their Exadata based on-premise warehouse. They chose their cloud components piece by piece and then used data virtualization both for their migration and for their universal consumption layer. The migration itself was seamless and had minimal impact on operation thanks to data virtualization. Additionally, they save money due to rapid prototyping and optimized resource usage, a benefit of the Denodo Platform being ‘tool agnostic’. Finally, through query optimization, Logitech’s data science and analytics are greatly accelerated and they consider this a critical aspect of their continuous innovation initiatives.
Will Your Company Be Next?
A complete move to the cloud might be a good solution for your data enterprise. If you make this move, you can follow the examples of many forward-thinking companies, and the Denodo Platform can be there to help you along the way.
Don’t miss any debate-style 3-part Experts Roundtable Series, and watch cloud service providers, systems integrators, and customer organizations duel it out with their insights into the statistics published from Denodo’s 2020 Global Cloud Survey.
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Thank you for this insightful blog post on successful cloud migrations! Your tips and strategies are extremely helpful and provide a great starting point for anyone looking to make the move to the cloud.