Simplifying and Expediting a Migration Using AWS Application Migration Service at the University of South Alabama

Brandon JonesCase Studies, Cloud and Virtualization, Higher Education, Offerings, Problem SolvedLeave a Comment

AWS lift-and-shift migration strategy

Housed in the College of Medicine at the University of South Alabama (USA), the Center for Strategic Health Innovation (CSHI) is a nationally recognized leader in innovative healthcare technology applications and the development and deployment of healthcare technology platforms, as well as the delivery of advanced preparedness teaching and training. CSHI’s cornerstone system is RMEDE™, the Real Time Medical Electronic Data Exchange, an industry-leading program that features predictive analytics capability, customizable ad hoc reporting, and is a world-class data warehouse architecture and business intelligence platform.

CSHI was able to decrease its infrastructure costs by 40-50%. Their application is now running faster with enhanced infrastructure designed for scalability, resiliency, and security.

We were tasked originally with performing a migration of CSHI’s infrastructure from their current provider into AWS within a strict three-week timeline. The initial solution focused on a traditional lift-and-shift migration to get the RMEDE™ data and application infrastructure to the AWS cloud. The AWS Application Migration Service was utilized to quickly migrate their application and data into AWS without changes and with minimal downtime.

Our team initially built out the AWS landing zone. Setting a multi-account AWS environment using AWS best practices. Security groups were identified earlier and had been created prior to replication of the existing infrastructure. Agent installation was completed on the source servers and a staging area subnet was created for replication onto low-cost EBS volumes.

Leveraging the AWS Application Migration Service minimizes time-intensive, error-prone manual processes by automatically converting the source servers from physical infrastructure to run natively on AWS. Replication occurred for all SQL Server databases, MySQL databases, application servers, and file servers. DNS was also migrated into AWS Route 53 to have AWS manage all newly created certificates.

The M&S team, together with the CSHI team, launched a series of non-disruptive tests before migrating to instill confidence that CSHI’s critical applications will work seamlessly on AWS. Once testing was completed, a planned cutover would occur during a small outage window during off-peak hours.

After we performed the migration and cutover, CSHI was able to decrease its infrastructure costs by 40-50%. Their application is now running faster with enhanced infrastructure designed for scalability, resiliency, and security. By leveraging the AWS Application Migration Service, it helped us migrate CSHI’s applications faster and allowed for a quick and smooth transition into AWS.

If you’d like to discuss your cloud migration plans with our experts, let’s set up a time to talk.

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