Data centre exit eliminates $2,000-$6,000 per server per year in infrastructure overhead. Done right, it modernises your platform. Done wrong, it creates migration debt. This guide covers full DC exit planning and costing.
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Expiring DC leases (avoid renewal commitment), hardware end-of-life (avoid refresh capex), Broadcom VMware licence cost increases, cloud-first board mandates, and talent availability (cloud engineers easier to hire than DC engineers). Use DC exit as opportunity to modernise.
One-time migration costs (tooling, professional services, data transfer), parallel running costs (3-6 months running both DC and cloud), training, and potential DC lease early termination fees. Ongoing savings: hardware refresh elimination ($500-2,000/server every 3-5yrs), DC rent/power ($200-400 per rack unit per year), hardware maintenance, network circuit costs.
Wave 0 (Wks 1-4): Quick wins — dev/test, monitoring, file servers. Zero production risk. Wave 1 (Wks 5-16): Production applications — standard web/app servers. Wave 2 (Wks 17-28): Complex workloads — databases, SAP, custom apps. Wave 3 (Wks 29-36): Last resort workloads — regulatory holds, end-of-life apps.
Use lift-and-shift for all Wave 0 and 1 (do not re-architect during DC exit), use cloud migration credits (AWS MAP, Azure Migration Program, Google Cloud incentives — typically $10K-$100K in credits), engage migration partner for execution, use TCOIQ for TCO analysis and assessment in days rather than weeks.
If lease expires in 18 months, you have 18 months to migrate all workloads. Timeline for 100 servers: assessment 4-8 wks, LZ setup 4-6 wks, migration waves 20-30 wks, decommission 4 wks. Total: 32-48 wks. Start assessment minimum 12 months before lease expiry.
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