White Paper: Migrating Email to the Cloud 2015, Cloud Point ltd. All rights reserved. INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY DISCLAIMER This white paper is for informational purposes only and is provided as is with no warranties whatsoever including any warranty of merchantability, fitness for any particular purpose, or any warranty otherwise arising out of any proposal, specification, or sample. No license, express or implied, to any intellectual property rights is granted or intended hereby. Cloud Point Ltd disclaim all liability, including liability for infringement of proprietary rights, relating to implementation of information in this specification. Cloud Point Ltd do not warrant or represent that such implementation(s) will not infringe such rights. Product or company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.
Email Migration Overview In the past most businesses have had a fairly steady process of upgrading from one version of Microsoft Office to the next to take advantage of new features and improved functionality. With the introduction of Office 365, the process has been changed from a major challenge every couple of years into a rolling programme of updates. Aside from the rolling updates system that Office 365 offers over traditional versions of the software, one of the major benefits is the cloud storage and improved collaboration that Office 365 brings. To fully realise the cloud potential of Office 365, businesses need to migrate their email systems from an on-premise solution such as Exchange 2013 to Office 365 Exchange Online, which migrates data and accounts to the cloud to provide more reliable access to information across multiple devices. While migration of email data from one platform (Exchange 2013) to another (Exchange Online) might seem like a simple task, the sheer volume of data and complexity that is contained in a corporate email system means that the process of migration needs to be fully planned and evaluated to reduce the risk of data loss. Cloud Point s experience in managing the process of email migration for businesses of all sizes, coupled with our development of our Cloud Migrator software package enables us to provide a seamless, well executed migration of your email data from most legacy platforms to Office 365 while retaining your data and account structure while minimising disruption for your staff. In this White Paper, we provide information about the benefits of Office 365 for email, along with an overview of our email migration planning process.
Benefits of Office 365 Exchange Online Microsoft Office 365 Exchange Online provides a wealth of benefits to a business from both a cost saving and efficiency perspective. When migration to the system is properly configured for your business needs and the migration is properly planned and executed, Exchange Online Email offers the following advantages over Exchange and other systems: Cost Benefits Lower local storage requirements as data hosted in the cloud Reduced need for local server hardware to host on-premise e-mail system Resource Benefits Fewer staff hours needed to support email, this frees up resource for other projects Microsoft SLA of 99.9% uptime provides increased availability Flexibility Benefits Email access anywhere on any device with the OWA web application Mailbox size can be increased up to 50GB per user as part of standard Office 365 package Compliance Benefits Mailboxes can be hosted locally if required by legislation Ability to have Office 365 accounts with "legal hold" capability
Drawbacks of Office 365 Exchange Online For most businesses, the advantages of the Office 365 cloud based email service provide a highly compelling reason to migrate, however there are some limitations that can affect larger organisations. Macro Support Some businesses with complex requirements within their email systems may use custom macros in order to handle messages in a particular way. While most of these will be fully supported due to being written in Visual Basic, there may be a requirement to provide some bespoke development in order to ensure that all functionality is maintained. File Size Limits Office 365 has a restriction of 100MB as the maximum size of a file that can be attached to an email. For most users this will not be an issue, however there are reasons why a large file may be sent via email such as a complex presentation. Users may need to change behaviours to use share drives or SharePoint for document management under these type of circumstance. Email Limits Office 365 places a limit of 10,000 unique email addresses as the maximum number of people that an individual can send emails to in a 24 hour period. This may cause issues in very large organisations where it can become difficult to communicate with people en masse. This can be addressed through the use of efficient use of emails, and also through the use of a corporate social network such as Yammer to handle mass communication. Data Storage Locations As a cloud based email system, Office 365 stores information outside a corporate network. In some cases an organisation may have to adhere to specific requirements about the storage of sensitive data which prevents it from migrating data to an external location. In this type of scenario, using Exchange 2013 as an email system is unavoidable, although it can be used in conjunction with the wider Office 365 suite in order to provide cost savings for the business. Cloud Back-Up Emails and contact information are an essential business asset, and it is vital that content is backed up for both compliance and operational reasons. Exchange Online is hosted in the cloud, and as such, back-up copies of all data are made so that in the event of an outage, information can be recovered. Control As part of the full Office 365 suite, Exchange Online includes full control over user accounts and access to information. Administrators can set up new accounts and provide access to email and other services through a single interface, rather than needing to create multiple accounts across the business to facilitate new starters, or staff leaving the business.
Key Issues for Business According to a survey by AMI Partners, there are a number of issues that contribute to the decision making process about email migration: Cloud Migration Concerns 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% Concerns about the Cloud Migration Process Data Security Features Cost Following on from concerns about the cloud in general, the biggest issues holding business from adopting a cloud infrastructure such as Exchange Online were the perception that the process of migrating would be difficult and that data security would be affected. Our Cloud Migrator software was developed in order to make the process of moving email to the cloud easier and to ensure protection of data. By automating many of the processes undertaken during a typical migration of 30 users from Exchange to Office 365, we are able to save an average of 19.5 hours compared to Microsoft s own products while retaining full control over the environment. This means that the cost of migrating to Office 365 is substantially reduced.
Overview of the Email Migration Process In order to minimise disruption during an email migration process, Cloud Point follow a wellstructured plan. By using our Cloud Migrator software to conduct a full audit of a business email environment ahead of any changes being made, we ensure that all data and structure can be retained. While email solutions like Office 365 include a migration connector, this is not sufficient to migrate all data. A frequent misconception is that the inbuilt migration tools will provide a seamless transition, however this is not the case. While emails themselves can be moved, the additional user data and relationships within the system are not handled well. To properly migrate from legacy email to Office 365 and maintain data integrity, it is essential to have a migration plan that takes into account all user data and relationships. Our email migration plans are designed to provide a seamless transition from your legacy system to Office 365 and include the migration of all information to the new system. Typically we follow the structure outlined below:
The Planning Process The first step in our planning process is to fully understand your current email system. Our Cloud Migrator tool does a full examination of your existing environment to identify the following from both client and server side storage: Account Information User accounts Depending on the existing software that your business uses to manage email, we will create a full list of the correct user accounts and use our software to map them to their new identity in Office 365. User accounts can come from a variety of different types including: Microsoft Active Directory Lotus Notes IDs. GroupWise user accounts We can also track email user accounts on systems including Google. Email Data In order to create a seamless experience for users, it is essential to be able to migrate all of their historic email content and to ensure that there is no duplication. This information can be gathered from two main sources: Server-side email This is the email content that is stored on the current mail server e.g.: Outlook Lotus Notes Google Mail IMAP Client-side email This is the email that is locally stored on a user s machine in their Outlook PST File, or accessed from POP3. In some cases, the data is stored on a file server rather than a local machine, however we can access it in either form. Address Books There are typically 3 main address books across your email environment that are stored in different places and used differently by the email servers: Corporate Address Book The main corporate address book for the entire email environment. This is a standard feature for most email platforms including Exchange and Lotus Notes. We use this information to gain a full picture of the scale of the migration project. Personal Address Books Each user has their own personal address book which is stored locally (client side) or on the main mail server (server side). These need to be synced from either Exchange or other email systems.
Client side address books are stored differently on Lotus notes in the Names.nsf file which needs to be built into the plan. Web Server Contacts Web based contact lists need to be handled slightly differently. In the case of Oracle Collaboration Server the data is separated between local and web based contact lists. Phone & PDA Contact Lists In a corporate environment, users will often maintain a slightly different address book on their mobile device which can present a challenge when integrating into a single address book for Office 365, Calendar Information Appointments Data Maintaining the integrity of employee appointment and calendar data is essential in providing a seamless transition to Office 365. Calendar information is often business critical due to the importance of client contact, so moving all data to the new platform is a key part of the migration process. Our Cloud Migrator can pull calendar data from a number of formats and sources to integrate it into the Office 365 Outlook Calendar.
Considerations For most businesses, the most common email upgrade path is from Microsoft Exchange / Outlook to Office 365 Email. This type of migration is generally more straightforward than migrations from alternative applications. Moving from solutions like Lotus Notes is more complex, but can still be handled properly when the differences between the systems are properly understood. Our Cloud Migrator software can be configured to recognise the different email solutions and behave accordingly. Key considerations in the move from Lotus Notes to Office 365 Email are as follows: Address Books In Lotus Notes, the address book is kept on the user s machine (client side) in a file called NAMES.NSF. This needs to be converted into the correct format before it can be imported into Office 365. Email Archive The user email archive is also hosted locally on a user s machine rather than on the email server. In order to ensure that this is correctly migrated without duplication, it needs to be fully analysed prior to migration. Rooms / Resources If room bookings and other shared resources within the business are managed using Lotus Notes, it is essential that these are maintained and migrated to ensure that they are accessible post migration, and also that all data is migrated to facilitate smooth operations within the organisation. Shared Mailboxes Departments or project teams often have a shared mailbox to ensure that they are fully abreast of work. Our Cloud Migrator software will retain information about shared mailboxes so that same relationships are maintained in Office 365.
The Migration & Testing Process Once configured with the specifics about your existing email environment, our Cloud Migrator software handles most of the heavy lifting involved in the email migration process: collating information, converting it into the correct format, and populating the new email database with the historic information to replicate your legacy email systems in the cloud. Although the software is highly reliable and accurate, quirks in individual systems mean that it is essential to perform testing and analysis throughout the process to ensure that email and contacts are properly migrated. We are rigorous in our testing process to provide your business with the smoothest possible transition: Stage 1: Configure Cloud Migrator Cloud Migrator was designed and built to manage all aspects of the email migration process, but as part of each project, we configure it to reflect the specifics of your environment including the following variables: Number of users to migrate Current environment From this we also assess the volume of data that is currently stored in your email environment so that we can fix a timeline for the project to minimise disruption. Stage 2: Test Migration We begin the migration project by trialling with a small group from your organisation. This allows us to ensure that the configuration is correct, and that there will be no further issues with the wider roll out. We look at a number of different areas: Folders Were all folders moved to Office 365 Was folder structure retained Were all messages in each folder migrated including Sent Mail Messages Was the status of each message properly migrated (read / unread) Are the email subjects correct in all cases Were the dates passed correctly (created, sent, received, replied) Attachments Users Were embedded attachments (e.g. images) properly migrated Are attached files correctly formatted and in place Is it possible to reply to the correct user from an email Have user address books been migrated
Stage 3: Final Testing and Configuration Following on from our test migration, we will further test any areas where there is a concern or where information was not properly migrated. This stage may involve migrating a further sample of users, or stress testing our software by migrating a particularly large account to ensure that the solution scales properly to your needs. Stage 4: Final Migration With proper preparation and testing, Cloud Migrator is able to automatically process email accounts, message data, and account relationships from your existing environment into Office 365. The amount of time that is required to handle the final migration is dependent on the number of users you have and the volume of data that needs to be migrated into the Office 365 cloud environment. In most cases, Cloud Point are able to conduct the entire migration in a single wave, however in larger organisations, we can schedule different groups for different phases in order to ensure that full continuity is maintained.
About Cloud Point Cloud Point is part of Intelligence Group; an ISO 9001 certified organisation and a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner with a specialist competency in Microsoft Cloud. We specialise in providing Cloud Services including Azure and Office 365 to our clients with a full range of services including development, hosting, consultancy, support and training. Our Managing Director, Steve Rastall has been named in Insider Magazine s Top 25 Up & Coming Entrepreneurs and we have also won a HOT 100 Fastest Growing Companies award. Since we were setup, we have at least doubled sales revenue every year via organic growth. For more information about the products and services offered by Cloud Point or to enquire about how our email migration services can help your organisation get more from Office 365 please visit our website: http://www.cloud-point.co.uk Or contact us using the following email address and telephone number: hello@cloud-point.co.uk 0151 350 6890