Most financial services firms didn't choose their current IT infrastructure so much as grow into it. Systems get added, data centres age and a setup that once worked perfectly well starts to demand more time just to keep it running. That time comes at a cost: every hour your IT team spends patching, maintaining or firefighting is an hour not spent on the digital services your customers now expect as standard.
Moving away from legacy infrastructure doesn't have to mean disruption or risk, every migration looks different, depending on the scale and complexity of your estate. JCB Finance, one of the UK's leading asset finance companies, migrated its IT estate to Microsoft Azure over 12 months, supporting improved scalability, resilience and security while maintaining day-to-day operations throughout the programme.
This article looks at why legacy infrastructure holds financial services firms back, how JCB Finance approached its migration and what a well-planned cloud transformation looks like.
Why legacy infrastructure holds financial services back
Our financial sector page sets out the balancing act financial services firms are managing: transforming legacy infrastructure into something scalable and secure, while still meeting strict compliance requirements around data integrity and confidentiality. Customers add another layer of pressure, expecting multi-channel, real-time access to their finances with privacy and security assured throughout.
Self-managed data centres were built for a different set of expectations. As customer demand shifts towards always-on, digital-first services, ageing infrastructure becomes a genuine constraint: harder to scale, harder to secure consistently, and increasingly reliant on internal teams spending their time maintaining what's already there rather than building what's next.
How JCB Finance moved beyond legacy infrastructure
JCB Finance offers fast, flexible asset finance to customers in the construction, agricultural and industrial sectors. As its business model shifted towards a digitally integrated, 24/7 online experience, its own data centres couldn't offer the scalability or resilience the new model demanded, and its IT team was spending a significant amount of time simply maintaining and patching existing infrastructure.
We acted as JCB Finance's cloud services partner, helping transform its existing IT infrastructure and applications to make them cloud ready, then migrating services away from legacy infrastructure onto Microsoft Azure over a 12-month period. As part of the migration, we worked closely with JCB Finance to test all disaster recovery plans and remove bottlenecks and single points of failure from the newly designed infrastructure, alongside a managed firewall service to strengthen its security posture.
David Smith, Head of IT at JCB Finance, said: “As we transition to become a more digitally integrated business, it is vital that we have a futureproof IT infrastructure. Microsoft Azure provides us with the flexibility, scalability and resiliency we need in order to deliver a great IT experience to our employees and customers. This has been a true digital transformation, and the support provided by Wavenet throughout the process has been invaluable.” Read the full JCB Finance case study for more detail on how the migration came together.
The result was an evergreen infrastructure with no legacy products left running, the ability to right-size server capacity in line with demand, improved security from moving to a SaaS and PaaS model, and significantly less time spent by the internal team managing infrastructure, with third-line support available from us when it's needed.
What a well-planned cloud transformation looks like
A handful of things consistently separate a smooth cloud transformation from a risky one:
- Getting existing infrastructure and applications cloud ready before migration begins, rather than lifting problems straight into the cloud
- Testing disaster recovery plans as part of the migration itself, not as an afterthought once it's complete
- Removing bottlenecks and single points of failure from the new design, rather than simply replicating the old one
- Strengthening security posture alongside the migration, including managed firewalls and modern access controls
- A phased approach over a realistic timeframe, so day-to-day operations continue without disruption
Legacy on-premises infrastructure vs modern managed cloud
| Aspect | Legacy on-premises infrastructure | Modern managed cloud |
| Scalability | Fixed capacity, sized for peak demand and rarely revisited | Can be scaled in line with agreed architecture, workload demand, and the management model in place. |
| Resilience | Single points of failure are common in ageing, self-managed data centres | Designed to support improved resilience through agreed architecture, redundancy and disaster recovery planning, with testing included where part of the scoped migration or service. |
| Patching and maintenance | Manual, time-consuming, and often delayed under pressure | Can reduce day-to-day maintenance effort through agreed monitoring, patching and optimisation controls, subject to service scope and workload supportability. |
| Security posture | Perimeter-based defences that get harder to keep current over time | Can strengthen security posture through agreed controls such as managed firewalls, monitoring, access management and Microsoft-native tooling, subject to service scope. |
| Remote and mobile access | Limited, often relying on workarounds like VPNs | Can support secure access from approved locations and devices where identity, access, connectivity and security controls are in place. |
| Cost model | Large upfront capital investment in hardware and its replacement | Usage-aligned costs can improve cost visibility and support budgeting where consumption, governance, and optimisation controls are in place. |
| IT team focus | Significant time spent keeping existing infrastructure running | Can reduce routine infrastructure management effort, helping internal teams focus more time on higher-value activity where services are appropriately managed. |
Cloud transformation and your wider technology estate
A cloud migration rarely stands alone. It tends to open up wider questions about hybrid cloud management, whether colocation or cloud is the right fit for specific workloads and how ready your existing estate really is for the move.
If you're still weighing that up, our blog on moving on from legacy IT and our wider introduction to what cloud computing actually involves are good starting points.
Getting started
- Map your current infrastructure and applications, and identify what genuinely needs to move versus what needs replacing
- Agree what cloud ready looks like for your business before migration begins
- Build disaster recovery testing into the migration plan itself, not as a separate later project
- Plan a phased timeline that protects day-to-day service for customers and staff throughout
- Decide upfront what ongoing support your internal team needs once the migration is complete
Cloud transformation for financial services in a nutshell
- Legacy infrastructure increasingly limits financial services firms just as customer expectations for digital, real-time services grow
- JCB Finance migrated its entire IT estate to Microsoft Azure over 12 months, supporting improved scalability, resilience and security while maintaining day-to-day operations throughout the programme
- A well-planned migration tests disaster recovery, removes single points of failure, and strengthens security alongside the move itself
- The result is a modernised cloud environment designed to support improved scalability, resilience, security and ongoing management, while reducing reliance on legacy infrastructure
Ready to talk about your cloud transformation?
Our Cloud & Modern Workplace solutions, including cloud computing, hybrid cloud management and colocation and data centre services, help financial services firms modernise infrastructure without adding risk. Talk to us about where your current infrastructure stands, see how we support the financial sector more broadly, or read more customer stories on our case studies hub, customer feedback page and resource centre.
Frequently asked questions
Is cloud migration risky for financial services firms?
Any migration carries some risk, but a phased approach, thorough disaster recovery testing, and getting applications cloud ready before migration begins all help keep that risk well managed, as it was throughout JCB Finance's 12-month migration.
How does moving to the cloud affect disaster recovery?
Done well, it strengthens it. As part of JCB Finance's migration, we tested all disaster recovery plans and removed single points of failure from the new infrastructure design, rather than simply replicating old vulnerabilities in a new environment.
Can legacy financial systems be migrated to the cloud?
In most cases, yes, though it usually requires transforming existing infrastructure and applications to make them cloud ready first, rather than migrating them as they are.
Does cloud migration affect our security or compliance posture?
It can improve it. Moving to a SaaS and PaaS model, combined with services like managed firewalls, often strengthens security compared with maintaining ageing, self-managed infrastructure.
How long does a cloud migration typically take?
Cloud migrations can range from a few weeks for smaller, straightforward workloads to several months for mid-sized environments. For larger organisations with multiple business-critical applications, complex dependencies and regulatory requirements, migration programmes often take between 6 and 18 months.
Will our IT team still have a role after migration to the cloud?
Yes, and often a more strategic one. JCB Finance's internal team spends significantly less time managing infrastructure day to day, freeing them up for higher-value work, with third-line support available when needed.
