Migrating to Linux

Many of IBM's Linux engagements involve customers migrating or consolidating workloads -- a task that Linux is well-suited to perform. Our clients are constantly looking for ways to improve their business and gain a competitive edge often requiring the migration of core infrastructure, applications and databases to a new environment.

Many customers are looking to replace aging, expensive legacy systems, and Linux provides a long-term, flexible operating system that can run on the hardware architecture best suited for their applications: POWER, x86/x64 and System z.

Over the years, IBM estimates having completed over 3,000 customer engagements that involved migrations from Sun/Solaris environments to Linux alone. A successful migration can yield substantial business advantages and rewards. Yet, if you wait until you need to migrate, many analysts say you've waited too long. "If it isn't broken, don't fix it," is a dangerous philosophy and in the end can significantly extend costs when migration becomes critical or necessary due to such factors such as poor performance, high support costs, or loss of faith in the current vendor.

IBM's world-class migration entity is called the Migration Factory. The Migration Factory uses a five-step process, which has been meticulously refined over 25 years. While no two projects are identical, the Migration Factory process helps ensure that each engagement is a success whether it's an infrastructure migration, database migration, ISV package, custom applications, or combination of all four.

Whatever your needs or current situation, IBM services and expertise are available worldwide to help you move to a Linux platform on IBM systems.