Application Modernization: Definition
Application Modernization, popularly called Legacy Modernization or Legacy Application Modernization, is the practice of updating the former software for newer data processing approaches. This includes newer languages, frameworks, and infrastructure platforms.
It is the software development equivalent of revamping an older home and improving its efficiency, safety, structural integrity, and much more. Instead of retiring the old system, Application Modernization extends the lifespan of business applications while benefitting from technological innovations.
Let’s first understand what is the legacy application?
A legacy application is a software program that is considered outdated and obsolete based on technology that is way too old than the current trends.
Replacing legacy applications with newer systems derived from modern technologies is one of the major challenges faced by many Information systems (IS) professionals.
Application Modernization: Introduction
The techno world is changing constantly at a rocket pace. When technology is not upgraded, it becomes challenging to solve bugs and other issues due to a lack of support and services. With such an outmoded system, businesses will fail in sustaining themselves in present market dynamics.
Alongside, their applications must be fast and user-friendly with a good user experience in order to beat the competition. Application Modernization approach luckily gives new hope to the sulking applications.
Applications play a vital role in organizations and their processes across the globe. Most of these applications have still become outdated, as they no longer relate to the dynamics that businesses require. This leads to rising administration and maintenance costs, which also hampers the action of innovation.
Did you know? The Markets and Markets report predicts that the growth of Application Modernization can reach USD 24.8 billion by the year 2025, at a growth rate of 16.8% from 2020 to 2025.
Other stats claim that maintaining the old legacy system is pretty much time-consuming and makes up to 60-80% of the IT spend in the average corporation. Furthermore, when the software is outdated, it will not be readily adapted to the newer systems.
Thus, Application Modernization can ensure operational cost savings along with lesser administration and support and acts as a boost for your innovation strategy.
Application Modernization: The Legacy Conundrum
Information Technology (IT) Companies with legacy applications often face challenges like incompatibility, unplanned maintenance costs, and lack of legacy coders. This adversely impacts an organization’s abilities to effectively attain the desired digital transformation. Legacy apps are difficult to integrate with today’s technologies like AI, IoT, and Cloud.
The statistical insights indicate:
- 90% of businesses are hindered from integrating the full digital technologies due to their high dependency such legacy systems
- 65% of businesses believe that legacy systems cannot address the evolving importance of the digital business
- 88% of IT leaders claim that modernized IT solutions and Application Modernization are critical to meet emerging demands
- 80% believe that businesses without modernized IT systems can be negatively impacted in the context of their future growth.
Application Modernization: Breaking the Legacy Conundrum
Precisely, Application Modernization is the process of updating the old legacy applications and creating fully new ones tailored to the business plans and goals.
Modernizing favors organizations to fend off the legacy code and benefit from the new, innovative tech. Rearchitecting legacy applications help businesses to realize the need for flexibility and agility in order to acknowledge the indispensable business needs for future growth.
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Why modernize your legacy applications?
Application modernization is important to effectively work in any organization with a modern runtime environment to learn, improve, update, transport, and modernize.
We will discuss the application modernization benefits in the section below in great detail. Let’s have a quick overview of the statistics that showcase the importance of modernizing your legacy applications that are critical to an organization’s business operations.
- Around 15-35% infrastructure year-over-year savings
- Around 30-50% lower application maintenance costs
- Around 74% lower costs on hardware, software, and company staff
- Around 10% improvement in overall operational efficiency
- Around 14% boost in annual revenue for large organizations
Across several industries, forward-thinking businesses are embracing new thinking and techniques around modernizations to make legacy an asset in order to grow in the market and beat the competitors.
Application Modernization: Benefits
Legacy application modernization is the right strategy to engage and bring new customers. Plus, it comes with many benefits like saving money and time.
Let’s have a look at some of the major benefits of application modernization to understand why you need to implement this in your company
1) Competitive edge
While the competitors are still contemplating, you can reach newer heights by embracing application modernization. Take the leap of faith by modernization the applications that can ail the organization’s digital adoption process. It will enable your organization to integrate modern platforms and technologies and outrun sluggards.
While choosing the apt software for business, every entrepreneur’s first concern is that software should meet their business expectations without considering its features. However, companies are always ready to shift and adopt new technology and trends. But, when the old legacy system becomes outdated, it is problematic for businesses to meet modern customers’ demands. Thus, the right application modernization strategy is that magic pillar of beating the competition.
2) Enhanced compatibility
Legacy application modernization enhances the system’s connectivity and compatibility with emerging technologies, platforms, and code. Additionally, it enables organizations to seamlessly function their applications, so they’re well-positioned to meet the current and future demands of several businesses.
3) Cloud-native
Application Modernization supports organizations in reshaping their legacy applications to cloud-native applications. This enables you to reap cloud advantages like faster speed, scalability, agility, efficiency, and reduced costs.
4) Better efficiencies
Application Modernization improves the overall efficiencies and business performance through refined bug fixes and security patches. Modernization leads the operational simplicity and wipes out the burden on IT executions.
Furthermore, if the team of developers and administrative staff can access modern technology, they become more productive than before as their manual stress is taken care of by such modern ways of technologies. Unfortunately, as a matter of fact, when one works on the same thing repeatedly, they get frustrated. Undoubtedly, Application Modernization is a perfect way to uplift the efficiencies of the staff.
5) Robust security
As per the recent survey, 87% of IT professionals agreed that legacy applications make businesses more exposed to security threats. The reason is those obsolete applications are incompatible with modern security authentication processes. Applications modernization can radically wipe out unwanted security threats that legacy systems pose.
6) Improved user satisfaction
Whether it’s your employees or users, using legacy applications can be a big problem. Applications Modernization with a user-friendly interface, top-edge functionalities, and innovative features will definitely enhance customer satisfaction and brand goodwill in the industry.
7) Staying relevant
The introduction of Application Modernization, enables organizations to make the best use of digital technologies like Artificial intelligence, machine learning, big data, and the cloud. Undoubtedly, it helps transform your IT ecosystem on the basis of current market trends and creates a flexible foundation for future growth with an innovative approach.
8) Productivity boost
According to IBM, updating legacy systems can boost developers’ productivity by 40%. Applications Modernization facilitates developers and engineering teams to work more efficiently and enhance time-to-market ultimately increasing their productivity at business levels.
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Ways To Modernize Traditional Applications:
There are 7 ways to modernize traditional applications to find a suitable cost-effective solution for businesses:
1. Encapsulate:
The first way of application modernization is to ‘encapsulate’ the application in order to break down the monolithic applications into smaller services applications.
2. ReHost
ReHost is a lift and swift model where the existing application is lifted from one infrastructure environment and rehosted on a more powerful one without any redesign or restructuring of the workflow.
3. RePlatform
In the RePlatform methodology of Application Modernization, the core application is not changed but the overall functionalities are customized and optimized to achieve a tangible platform.
4. ReFactor
ReFactor approach is quite similar to the ReHost approach, but with some enhancements to components of the old application while performing the refactoring steps.
5. ReArchitect
It is one of the complex methodologies to re-imagine the way application architect is designed and conceptualized with cloud-native tools to adopt modern technologies. This method can be expensive yet fruitful if you have the ability to sustain digital transformation.
6. ReBuild
ReBuilding is rewriting the entire mobile application component from the scratch. It is redeveloped in a manner that preserves the original specifications of the legacy application. It uses the same approach as rearchitect method but rather than remodeling, it starts from scratch.
7. RePlace
This is a final methodology that completely replaces the existing application with a new one including a new structure, features, scope, and functionalities. In this model, more robust and scalable technologies such as Cloud computing is deployed in order to reduce cost and improve productivity.
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Final Note:
Application modernization is just a single part of moving your organization forward, a move towards greater automation should start with measurable and successful projects, which you can then scale and optimize in other parts of your organization.
Although there are multiple approaches for Application Modernization, any business must select the right experts who can align with the company’s strategic preferences.
One great and efficient option for achieving Application Modernization is partnering with an external service provider – Mobcoder. We are uniquely positioned in modernizing old mobile applications and transform them into robust, scalable, and powerful mobile apps.
Our services related to cloud app modernization are also designed to help companies bring forward their business processes and legacy application estates into the cloud. These will help you to transfer your existing application portfolio to a new cloud environment.
Our hands-on developers have the ability to accelerate cloud application modernization and migration by reviewing your app architecture, code, and development practices.
No doubt, we can help you plan and implement the right modernization strategy based on your current and future business wants. Do not hesitate to reach out to us at Mobcoder to improve the value of your existing apps and reduce their maintenance cost.
