Virtual Machine Migration to AWS by Firemind

Overview: Most migrations are, by count, virtual machines. The risk is in treating them all the same: copying oversized machines, carrying end-of-life operating systems across, and paying for licences you no longer need. Built on Firemind's IT Operations Engine, this service runs the migration as governed code in your AWS account, and the same Engine runs each workload once it lands.

Four stages, contracted together or separately

• Assess. Discovery of every machine across your hypervisors and clouds, sized from utilisation, with workshops to confirm owners and dependencies. Aligned to the Assess phase of the AWS Migration Acceleration Program (MAP): a readiness assessment based on the AWS Cloud Adoption Framework, a migration path for every workload, a business case with an AWS Pricing Calculator estimate, and a wave plan.
• Mobilize. Landing zone readiness, detailed discovery and planning for the first waves, a pilot migration, and MAP tagging set up so migrated workloads are tracked from day one.
• Migrate. Machines rehosted to Amazon EC2 with AWS Application Migration Service, or with AWS Transform for VMware for VMware sources, right-sized on arrival, with operating system upgrades and replatforming to managed services where the assessment shows the case.
• Operate. The Engine runs the migrated workloads: monitoring, incident remediation, patching and decay management such as end-of-life runtimes, with high-risk changes held for a named approver. Each wave lands in operations the day it passes acceptance.

Validated and governed

Every wave starts with acceptance tests agreed with your team: functional checks, performance baselines and data comparisons wherever data moves. They run before and after cutover, and every wave has a tested rollback. The Engine plans each change, raises it as code and runs it under your change rules. Low-risk, reversible steps run automatically. Cutovers and other high-risk changes wait for a named approver. Every action is recorded in an immutable audit trail and in your own AWS CloudTrail.

What is in scope

• Replication, test launches and cutover with AWS Application Migration Service
• Right-sizing, and AWS Graviton moves where workloads support them
• Operating system upgrades for end-of-life systems, in the move or straight after it
• Windows Server and SQL Server licensing carried through to the AWS design
• Patching, backup and monitoring in place from the first day on AWS

What stays out of scope

Application code changes stay out of scope unless agreed in the private offer. Machines that should not move are recommended for retirement or retention and listed for you.

AWS programmes: Firemind holds the AWS Migration and Modernization Competency. Eligible migrations may qualify for MAP funding, and Firemind prepares the MAP documentation with your AWS account team. Eligibility and funding are confirmed by AWS.

How it starts: After the private offer is accepted, you grant read-only access to the hypervisors and clouds that run your machines and deploy an IAM role in your AWS account using AWS CloudFormation. A full description of the role and its policy statements is provided before deployment. The Engine uses temporary credentials, and every action is recorded in your own AWS CloudTrail. Scope, acceptance tests and named approvers are agreed at the start of each stage.

Deployment: Pilot scopes run from Firemind's AWS environment. In production the Engine runs inside your own AWS accounts. Running the Engine, and the migrated workloads, may incur AWS infrastructure charges, for example Amazon Bedrock, compute and storage. These are billed separately from this AWS Marketplace transaction and are your responsibility.

Pricing: Delivered through an AWS Marketplace private offer, scoped to your estate. The four stages can be contracted together or separately. Contact hello@firemind.com  to scope.

About Firemind: AWS Premier Tier Services Partner with the AWS Migration and Modernization Competency. 200+ clients since 2018, ISO 27001 certified, in partnership with AWS, NVIDIA and Anthropic. Core markets: UK and Ireland, Finland, Germany and the Netherlands.