Strategies and Challenges in Cloud-to-Cloud Migration Using Infrastructure as Code

Abstract

As the landscape of cloud computing continues to transform at a rapid pace, organizations seek to optimize operational costs, enhance system flexibility, and adjust to changing market demands. This paper reports a case study within a Finnish startup operating in self-service mobile payment systems. It provides a detailed analysis of migrating an application architecture from DigitalOcean to AWS (Amazon Web Services) using the AWS Cloud Development Kit (CDK), providing insights into the strategies, challenges, and outcomes of the process. The key findings suggest that while cloud migration involves considerable technical and operational challenges, the utilization of IaC (Infrastructure as Code) can significantly mitigate these obstacles, enhancing the speed, reliability, and security of the migration process. This research contributes to the limited literature on cloud-to-cloud migration, highlighting the effective use of IaC to facilitate transitions between cloud environments.