Cloud Migration from Mainframes for State Agencies Continue in 2022, But May Face Cost Challenges

Mike Boyle, Vice President of Sales at TCC

According to an article by Phil Goldstein on the State Tech Magazine website, cloud migrations for state and local agencies continue in 2022 but may face some challenges. https://statetechmagazine.com/article/2021/12/2022-tech-trends-cloud-migration-state-and-local-agencies-will-be-measured

Migrations to cloud architecture in state agencies accelerated due to the pandemic but there are technological, cost, and operational challenges that may slow the pace of cloud adoptions in 2022.

One of those challenges is certainly cost. The article quotes a report from  a study by  by the National Association of State Chief Information Officers (NASCIO) and Accenture, “A fresh look: Capitals in the Clouds,” which included data from 35 states, found that many states are still using legacy mainframe technology. “The switch from mainframe on-premises to a mainframe as a service (MFaaS) is slow — as nearly all states, 89 percent, report that they have a mainframe computer and 71 percent indicate that they have not moved any applications to MFaaS,” the report notes. “The primary driver for moving to MFaaS is cost savings.”

Moving from on-premises mainframes to the cloud requires adjusting procurement and budget models and that is a challenge for many state governments.

Also, the article notes “There are several reasons state and local governments stay with legacy IT instead of moving to the cloud. For one, mainframes “offer tremendous throughput,” Sweden says, and many state governments “rely on them for heavy transaction processing and analytics, and they are extremely durable, adaptable, reliable. Security is a real strength regarding mainframe computers.” 

“States may want to move to MFaaS, Sweden says, “but when we see the cost of security and data management costs related to cloud services, it starts to erode the list of advantages related to cloud services.” 

The article concludes that many agencies will decide that the economics favor the adoption of a hybrid IT approach, keeping some applications on-premises while moving others to the cloud.

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