Application Modernization – Bring New Life to Legacy Systems

Some things get better with age or increase in value over time. With IT systems, however, it is the other way. The older the systems are, the more likely they will need to be updated as requirements change, or new features are added.

As systems age, it is also possible they become more costly and tough to support and maintain. Thus, the need for platform modernization and application modernization needs to be taken seriously by organizations around the world.

The legacy applications or systems deeply rooted in the organization’s value chain contain valuable data. They also support core business functions that are essential for digital business initiatives.

Along with building newer Cloud-native applications, application leaders must modernize their legacy applications. This is to enable interoperability.

In other words, there is an opportunity to overhaul the entire application (and not just parts of the code). This is to take advantage of new application architectures and application access.

Modernization of core business applications or systems has always been around. But in the recent past, customer needs have become a priority. Application modernization no longer focuses on only software and hardware. Now it also involves intra–and inter-business unit processes.

This is because customers drive technology advancement and modernization today. Thus, application development, upgrade and operations approaches would need support and staff training. These are staff involved in not just technology but also in the changing industry landscape.

What exactly is Application Modernization?

Legacy application modernization is a plan to produce new business value from aging applications. It means modernizing them with up-to-date features and capabilities.

Migrate your legacy applications and embrace recent functionalities that align with your business requirements.
Application modernization helps in:

• making the most of digital technologies
• building more efficient, scalable, modern solutions
• optimizing performance
• improving user experience
• enhancing security
• building a flexible foundation for innovation

The approach to modernization depends on the health of each component of the application. This is as dictated by business fit, business value, and agility.

The major variables while assessing the health of the whole application are:

• Application Modernization: This shows whether the application needs to get a new functionality
• Process Modernization: The methods of application access, securities would need to change.
• Infrastructure Modernization: The deployment environment where the application runs would need to change.

Now that you are familiar with the variables, read on to know about the steps.

Steps for modernization

Here are the steps for modernization:

• Assessment of the legacy system
• Identification of new features, functionalities, technology, and industry standards
• Modernization approach like moving from on-prem to cloud, containerization, microservices, and serverless
• Executing the plan using Agile methodologies
• Testing and validating the modernized system as per new requirements

Once the organization decides to go ahead with legacy application modernization, there can be huge benefits.

These benefits are viewed through these lenses: operational improvement or competitive differentiation.

Benefits of Application Modernization

Let us have a look at some of the benefits:

Cost-effectiveness

Maintaining legacy IT systems is extremely costly. With modernization, you can re-architect your legacy code with modern open-source languages. This helps you reduce the cost of having highly capable developers maintain code that few can work with. It also reduces application incidents overall.

Agility

Legacy systems minimize a business’ capacity to form new features and services. Instead, most allot a team to break-fix and manage without a plan.

You can omit these restrictions by bringing your legacy software to the Cloud. This is by rolling out microservices and containerization. This also gives your company the ability to add new features and functionality.

Effortless maintenance

New age applications are less complex and highly flexible. Legacy applications are localized and monolithic.
Applications operating in Cloud-based systems offer greater mobility. They can be accessed and maintained from anywhere. It is easy to maintain automated processes of well-integrated applications that re-use code.

All said and done, modernizing your application is the key to your digital transformation success. Application modernization allows organizations to transform time-tested legacy applications to newer technologies and architecture. The result is delivering greater business value.

Modernizing software products can be a long journey. You may want incremental transformations or a complete metamorphosis of your digital journey. It is essential to keep the product modernization vision at the core of your business strategy.

Nitor Infotech’s dedicated technology specialists are guides throughout your entire modernization journey. They help right from initial assessment to implementation and monitoring.

You can read our case study about a world-leading software product development company. Nitor Infotech experts modernized their legacy desktop application to a mobile-first web app.

For more information, write to us. Visit us at Nitor Infotech to learn about our product modernization services.