In their quest to generate digital revenue, expand their markets, and address new customer personas, regional enterprises must leverage modern applications and deliver through digital platforms while continuously innovating for performance.
IDC estimates that as many as 750 million cloud-native applications could be built by 2025. Consequently, application modernisation is increasingly becoming a top concern for CIOs due to its growing complexity and urgency.
Modern software applications have become complex, requiring enterprises to continuously assess their systems and network infrastructure to ensure there are no availability gaps to deliver high-engagement digital experiences through the cloud.
Although most IT decision-makers recognise the importance of prioritising application modernisation in their forward-thinking IT strategies, only a quarter have realised this crucial objective. Typically, this entails modernising applications, updating underlying data infrastructure, and upgrading system hardware.
Conversely, attempting to achieve modern-day digital business objectives using legacy applications and infrastructure poses several challenges and pain points for IT administrators:
- Legacy applications have extended release and upgrade cycles.
- They are slow and less adaptable to customer requirements.
- Legacy systems experience more frequent and costly downtimes.
- Legacy applications pose higher security risks.
- They contribute significantly to an enterprise’s technical debt.
- Legacy applications often serve as critical business applications with monolithic architectures and software development practices.
So, what steps should CIOs take to accelerate their application modernisation initiatives?
Assessment and prioritisation
Commence by thoroughly evaluating current applications to identify those most crucial for modernisation. Prioritise based on criteria such as business impact, technical indebtedness, and alignment with strategic objectives.
Develop a comprehensive strategy
Craft a comprehensive strategy outlining the objectives, timelines, and resources required for application modernisation. Ensure this strategy closely aligns with the organisation’s IT and business goals.
Embrace agile and devOps practices
Embrace agile development methodologies and DevOps practices to streamline modernisation, enhance collaboration between development and operations teams, and expedite delivery cycles.
Adopt microservices architecture
Monolithic and inefficient legacy systems can transform into efficient and adaptable solutions by embracing microservices. Microservices encapsulate legacy software, facilitating modernisation to enhance business processes and customer experiences. These services dismantle sprawling, monolithic applications into smaller, more manageable components with clearly defined boundaries. This approach aids in enhancing the performance and maintainability of legacy applications.
Leverage Cloud and Containerization
Harness cloud services and containerisation technologies to modernise applications, enhance scalability, and boost flexibility. This facilitates more straightforward deployment and management of applications within contemporary cloud environments.
Application Refactoring
Application refactoring aims to make the codebase more straightforward to understand, modify, and extend, ultimately leading to better software application performance, reliability, and agility. This can involve optimising algorithms, simplifying complex code, removing redundant code, improving error handling, and updating outdated libraries or frameworks.
Organisations contemplating application modernisation must evaluate their existing technology stack and pinpoint outdated or ineffective components requiring an upgrade. They should provide intuitive, responsive, and feature-rich experiences across various devices and platforms. Security and compliance considerations should take precedence throughout the journey of modernisation. Implementing rigorous security measures safeguards sensitive data and ensures industry regulations and standards adherence.
Additionally, organisations should strategise for the future by embracing technologies and architectures conducive to ongoing innovation and adaptability. Modernised applications should be engineered to seamlessly integrate emerging technologies, respond to market trends, and capitalise on business opportunities.
