Cloud transformation provides platform for growth at Europa

Normally, we’d advise allowing plenty of time to move your company infrastructure into the Cloud.

But, as is so often the case, business requirements frequently dictate the terms of a project.

When global real estate investment firm, Europa Capital, found themselves in need of a rapid transition to the Cloud, they put the challenge to us to do it in less than four months.

Here’s what we achieved:

In need of a quick cloud turnaround

Europa was already a Kocho client when the need for a cloud migration arose.

Initially starting out as a managed services client, we supported Europa on its journey to become greater with a complete transformation roadmap.

The SharePoint migration formed a key part of that journey, but we were also supporting across projects involving Microsoft Defender, Endpoint Manager, and security and compliance.

The urgency to migrate to the Cloud came from a physical change.

Europa was looking to move/expand their on-premises office and infrastructure.

As part of the change, it wanted all employees to have the same experience, be subject to the same security standards, and access the same resources regardless of whether they were at home or in the office.

Lift and shift at speed with SharePoint and OneDrive

There were two core elements to this project:

1. Migrate all data to cloud storage
2. Ensure secure access to corporate devices

In a two-phased approach, we first migrated all personal drives into OneDrive to avoid local storage of sensitive files and bring them under the protection and management of the Azure cloud.

Secondly, we worked with Europa to move shared department documents into SharePoint libraries. These OneDrive and SharePoint libraries were then configured for automatic mapping to ensure quick access and stable performance.

The now redundant file servers could then be safely decommissioned.

This part of the project was completed in less than a month. Surpassing Europa’s expectations for delivering changes quickly, without disruption to the business’ existing architecture or systems.

Supported change for quick adoption

Tying each phase of the project together was a tailored change and tech adoption programme.

This involved examining Europa’s current ways of working and identifying opportunities to use new cloud technology for maximum efficiency.

This provided much needed guidance and support during the migration.

An ongoing journey to greatness

We supported Europa with our managed services before the transformation journey and will continue our support across everything we’ve implemented going into the future.

Working as a partnership, our support desk and managed services will keep Europa operating at its best.

Keeping on top of the latest developments and new technologies from Microsoft.

This continuous process of analysis, improvement, and innovation means that Europa can stay at the cutting-edge of their industry.

Next steps