On-Prem Data Center Network Service Migration to the Cloud

The cloud is the rainmaker that businesses always wanted. It helps them drive agility, deliver market differentiation, develop new products, find new revenue streams, transform business models, increase the scale of operations, and accelerate time-to-market. These are some reasons why the majority of companies are migrating their applications and data to the cloud. As per a study by O'Reilly Media, 88% of companies already use the cloud to host some of their applications and data. However, there is no denying that cloud migration success is invariably anchored to the network. It is what enables user access to cloud resources. Also, application performance is directly tied to network performance. As a result, although the cloud is taking over the computing space, it cannot do this without cloud networks. Its agility, performance, security, and efficiency are indispensable for companies using public cloud services. Therefore, migrating network services such as VPN, firewall, and load balancer from the on-prem data center to the cloud is the need of the hour to tap into the benefits the cloud offers.

Advantages of Cloud-based VPN, Firewall, and Load Balancer Network Services

Cloud VPN:

• Securely connects to cloud deployments over the public network via an IPsec VPN connection.
• The traffic is encrypted with IPsec protocols to protect data as it travels over the internet.
• Provides a secure connection that can be quickly deployed globally for improved network access and performance.
• Scales more easily. Enables companies to increase or decrease VPN user counts and bandwidth as needed.
• Offers mobile support for remote workers.
• Makes a company’s cloud architecture much more flexible, agile, and scalable.

Cloud Firewall:

• Forms a virtual barrier around cloud infrastructure and applications.
• Enables companies to secure their ever-expanding network perimeter and ensure secure access to cloud assets.
• Seamlessly integrate with cloud infrastructure.
• Multiple cloud deployments can be secured at once.
• Scales up rapidly to handle high traffic.

Cloud Load Balancer:

• It takes advantage of the cloud's scalability and agility to meet the demands of distributed workloads with high numbers of client connections.
• Maximizes application performance and reliability.
• Helps companies achieve high-performance levels at potentially lower costs than traditional on-premises load balancing technology.
• Improves application availability, increases throughput, and decreases latency.
• It is a software-defined managed service.

Challenges in Migrating Network Services to the Cloud

Migrating on-prem data center network services to the cloud offers a myriad of advantages, but it is not without challenges. The fear of downtime haunts most companies during network migration to the cloud, as downtime results in revenue loss, brand reputation, and customer base. It may be caused due to inaccurate calculation of network bandwidth requirement during migration to support the existing cloud services. Or improper migration of network load balancer that affects the availability and performance of applications in the cloud. Besides, any cloud migration, which also applies to networks, is associated with data security issues that can complicate compliance adherence. Finally, aligning all the stakeholders to assess the application hosted behind Cloud Network Services will be a lengthy process, laden with human errors that can prevent the faster realization of cloud network benefits.

The following network migration methodologies can help companies overcome migration challenges and unleash the benefits of moving to the cloud. These are proven to be standard and the most successful ways to migrate network services – VPN, firewall, and load balancer – from the on-prem data center to the cloud.

BYOIP – Retaining the Existing IP Approach

For companies that have IP addresses for their network services hard-coded in devices or built application dependencies on specific IP addresses, Bring your own IP addresses (BYOIP) approach is best for network migration. It helps them retain the existing network policies and management processes enabling hassle-free migration to the cloud.

They can use VMware HCX Network Extension to stretch layer 2 networks from on-prem data centers to the cloud without network reconfiguration. The virtual instances of VPN, firewall, and load balancer can be moved between on-premises and cloud environments while retaining the existing IP addresses.

In addition, VMware NSX-T can seamlessly extend a company’s network from on-premises to the cloud with full visibility, enterprise-grade L2 and L3 networking functionality, and micro-segmentation. As a result, the companies can retain their IP, and networking policies, without having to reassign IP or rewrite policies for the public cloud.

As the last step, clean up the network segment extension.
- If HCX is used - unstretch network segment
- If NSX is used – cleanup the L2VPN configuration

Move to a new IP address approach

It is usually considered a value add to get a new IP address for network resources when migrating to the cloud to avoid conflicts on the cloud network. To achieve this, companies can implement virtual instances of VPN, firewall, and load balancer in the target cloud and document the readiness test. Then configure their new IP address, route the new network segment on the appropriate link and check the reachability. With agreed downtime for network services, move the VPN and load balancer-dependent servers in either a phase-by-phase approach or in one big wave approach to the target cloud.

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