Break Free from On-Premises Virtualization: Why Now’s the Time to Migrate to AWS

Today, the burden of managing infrastructure, particularly as it ages, fundamentally limits many businesses’ ability to innovate and stay competitive. Small and medium-sized businesses are under increasing pressure to do more with less and use valuable IT resources to create applications that support your unique business needs.

Hidden Costs and Operational Risks

On-premises hypervisors once promised flexibility and control, but today’s reality is far more challenging:

• Escalating Licencing Costs: Shifting vendor models and frequent price increases are squeezing IT budgets, forcing difficult decisions about renewals and upgrades.
• Hardware Lifecycle Management: Physical infrastructure demands ongoing capital investment, warranty renewals and maintenance contracts, tying up resources that could be better spent elsewhere.
• Limited Scalability: Scaling up means procurement delays, capital expenditures and physical installation – none of which match the speed of modern business.
• Operational Overhead: Managing on-prem environments requires specialized skills, constant monitoring and manual intervention for upgrades, patching and troubleshooting.
• Security and Compliance Risks: Legacy systems often lack the latest security features, making it harder to meet evolving compliance requirements and exposing the business to risk.

These challenges are compounded by the need to innovate quickly, support remote work and respond to market changes. Staying on-premises can hold your business back and increase exposure to operational and financial risk.

Migrating to AWS is not just a technical project, it’s a strategic decision that unlocks new possibilities:

• Agility and Scalability: Instantly scale resources up or down to meet demand. No more waiting for hardware deliveries or capacity planning headaches.
• Cost Optimization: Shift from unpredictable capital expenses to transparent, pay-as-you-go operational costs. AWS’ pricing models and cost management tools help you optimize spend and eliminate waste.
• Access to Advanced Technologies: Leverage AWS’s vast ecosystem – machine learning, analytics, automation and more – to drive innovation and gain competitive advantage.
• Resilience and Availability: AWS’ global infrastructure delivers high availability, disaster recovery and business continuity that’s hard to match on-prem.
• Security and Compliance: Benefit from AWS’ robust security frameworks, continuous compliance updates and industry certifications.

When considering AWS migration, many organizations hesitate, worried about:

• Where to start and what to move first
• Minimizing business disruption
• Keeping the cloud optimized and secure over time

The perception of complexity often comes from legacy dependencies, security concerns, cost uncertainty and skill gaps. But these challenges are solvable:

• Automated Discovery and Assessment: Modern tools map your environment, highlight what’s ready for migration and flag potential blockers – delivering a clear, actionable roadmap.
• Built-In Security and Compliance: CDW and AWS integrate security and compliance best practices into every step, so you don’t have to reinvent your security posture.
• Minimal Downtime: Services helping migrations replicate live systems with minimal impact, while tools like AWS DataSync streamline large data transfers.
• Expert Support: Whether you work with AWS directly or a partner like CDW, you have access to proven methodologies and ongoing support.

No two migrations are identical. AWS offers a spectrum of strategies to fit your business goals, technical requirements and risk tolerance:

• Lift and Shift: Move virtualized workloads to AWS with minimal changes for quick wins and immediate cost savings.
• Replatforming: Make targeted adjustments to leverage AWS features like managed services and improved performance.
• Refactoring: Redesign applications to fully leverage cloud-native capabilities, unlocking the greatest long-term benefits.
• Hybrid Migration: Keep some systems on-premises while migrating others, ensuring business continuity and giving teams time to adapt.
• Phased Migration: Migrate in stages, starting with non-critical workloads, learning from each phase and gradually moving more complex systems. This reduces risk and builds organizational confidence.

Each strategy is supported by AWS’ robust migration tools and CDW’s expert guidance, ensuring your journey away from on-premises virtualization is optimized for your unique needs.

Migrating away from on-premises virtualization often includes several hidden challenges – like an iceberg, these tend to be hidden beneath the surface. These challenges include support, licencing, infrastructure, skill gaps, integration complexity, governance, compliance and additional costs.

AWS addresses these challenges comprehensively, offering scalable, secure and cost-effective solutions that accelerate migration and deliver long-term business value.

Support & Maintenance

AWS provides enterprise-grade, 24/7 support with multiple tiers, proactive monitoring and automated incident response. Managed services reduce internal burden.

Software & Licencing Costs

Transparent, pay-as-you-go pricing eliminates surprise costs. AWS Cost Explorer and Budgets tools help track and optimize spend.

Infrastructure

AWS global infrastructure offers instant scalability, built-in redundancy and high availability – without capital investment.

Skillsets & Training

AWS offers extensive training, certifications and managed services to reduce the need for deep infrastructure expertise.

Integration

AWS supports APIs, SDKs and integration services like Lambda and EventBridge. Migration tools and AWS Marketplace simplify integration.

Time & New Skills

Automated migration services minimize manual effort and downtime. Best practices accelerate adoption and reduce learning curve.

Scripts (IaC) & Code Conversion

AWS CloudFormation, Red Hat Ansible and Hashicorp Terraform enable infrastructure as code using familiar languages.

Governance & Controls

AWS Organizations, Control Tower and Service Catalog provide centralized governance, policy enforcement and cost controls.

Security & Compliance

AWS offers advanced security services and continuous compliance certifications to protect workloads and meet regulations.

Additional Costs

AWS eliminates hidden hardware and maintenance costs. Flexible pricing models like Saving Plans reduce expenses.

Enterprise discussions show that migration timelines are flexible, typically ranging from four weeks to a few months depending on scope and resource availability. Integration with existing systems – like high-speed links (AWS Direct Connect), managed file systems and federated identity – makes the transition seamless. Most on-premises tools and processes have direct analogues in AWS, so teams can continue working as they always have, just with more agility and scalability.

Organizations that migrate away from on-premises virtualization to AWS report:

• Reduced IT Spend: Lower hardware, licencing and maintenance costs.
• Faster Innovation: Rapid adoption of new technologies and services.
• Improved Security: Up-to-date protections and compliance.
• Operational Efficiency: Less time spent on manual tasks, more focus on strategic initiatives.
• Business Agility: Ability to pivot quickly in response to market demands.

Rising costs, complexity and the need for agility make AWS migration not just attractive, but essential. By breaking free from legacy constraints and embracing cloud-native solutions, your organization can unlock new levels of efficiency, innovation and resilience.

CDW and AWS together offer a partnership built to reduce risk, accelerate transformation and modernize with intent rather than trial and error. Navigating the complexity of AWS can be challenging, but CDW’s deep enterprise experience fundamentally changes the equation.

For decades, CDW has designed, built and supported high-stakes enterprise infrastructure. That heritage matters in the cloud. When organizations move to AWS, the hardest part is not learning new services; it is understanding the environment they are coming from and knowing how to translate existing controls, dependencies and operational patterns into a modern cloud model. CDW excels at this translation layer.

Think of it like hiring a contractor who already understands how your house was built. They know where the wiring runs, which walls carry load and what cannot be touched without consequences. That familiarity eliminates surprises.

In the same way, CDW brings an intimate understanding of enterprise security models, networking architectures, identity systems and governance frameworks. We integrate these into AWS so your teams operate with familiar guardrails while gaining the scalability, automation and resilience of the cloud.

Most organizations cannot simply lift workloads into AWS and expect them to fit. CDW bridges the existing world with the new one. It is like shifting from a traditional vehicle to a modern EV. The technology is more capable, but the controls work the way you expect. You do not relearn how to drive; you benefit from more speed, efficiency and intelligence. CDW ensures your AWS environment behaves consistently with how your business already operates, while still unlocking the advantages of a cloud-native platform.

This enterprise lens is backed by a dedicated AWS practice with hundreds of engineers, extensive AWS certifications and proven methodologies across migrations, modernization, hybrid and multicloud patterns, analytics and AI. CDW’s managed services, automation frameworks, security tooling and 24x7 support extend that foundation, providing continuous governance, cost control and operational stability.

By choosing CDW and AWS, your organization gains a partner that reduces risk, accelerates outcomes and delivers a structured, defensible path to modernization. You can innovate without abandoning what already works, and scale with confidence in a rapidly evolving digital landscape.