Six Brands, One Platform, Over $50M in Projected Savings
Allyship Snapshot
Use Cases
- Hypervisor platform exit and modernization
- IT consolidation post-merger
- Large-scale VM migration to cloud
- Data center rationalization and shutdown planning
- Vendor contract optimization
Solutions
- Migration factory
- AWS migration and managed services
- Multi-vendor partnership orchestration
- Managed services for hybrid infrastructure
Outcomes Achieved
The Challenge
A Merger Demands More Than Integration
A major U.S. retail holding company was recently formed through an all-equity merger, bringing six iconic brands under one roof. With over 1,800 stores, a significant e-commerce presence, and approximately 60,000 employees, the newly combined organization faced immediate pressure to unify disparate technology environments while continuing to serve more than 60 million customers without disruption.
Each brand carried its own infrastructure, contracts, and operational rhythms. Rising licensing costs from an incumbent virtualization vendor added financial strain, and internal teams were stretched thin managing both legacy systems and integration efforts. Retail blackout windows (periods when no changes can be made to protect peak trading) compressed the timeline further.
Leadership had a bold ambition: to become the largest unified loyalty brand in the world. But that vision required a technology foundation that didn’t yet exist. Continuing with fragmented systems and escalating vendor costs was not an option.
The Journey
Delivery Excellence Leads to Strategic Partnership
Ensono had supported two of the merging brands for years, including with mainframe management and a prior infrastructure engagement. When the new organization needed help navigating a complex virtualization contract renewal, Ensono stepped in, securing improved pricing and more favorable terms while providing managed services that kept operations stable during the transition.
That delivery quality made the difference. When leadership began planning the next phase (a full modernization from their existing platform), they didn’t issue an RFP. Instead, they named Ensono their preferred partner and sole-sourced the engagement.
Our Approach
Ensono is orchestrating a multi-partner partnership model to address the complexity and scale of the transformation:
- Discovery and alignment: Joint working sessions with the client’s leadership team define priorities, constraints, and success criteria.
- Business case development: A compelling case built around reduced technical debt, a simplified technology footprint, and accelerated progress toward the client’s unified brand strategy.
- Platform strategy: A target architecture combining AWS for cloud workloads and a replacement hypervisor for the remaining on-premises requirements.
- Funding orchestration: Ensono’s AWS partnership is leveraged to secure significant migration funding, offsetting 100% of the transition costs.
- Migration execution: Our “migration factory” approach moves 10,000 virtual machines to modern platforms—while respecting retail blackout windows and maintaining service continuity.
- Data center consolidation: A roadmap reduces the client’s footprint from seven North American data centers to a unified environment.
- Managed services continuity: Ongoing operational support throughout the transformation enables internal teams to focus on strategic priorities.
The Outcomes
A Unified Foundation
The engagement positions the client to achieve significant cost savings while building the unified technology foundation their business strategy demands. By trusting Ensono to carry out this work, the client’s internal teams have been freed up to focus on loyalty, e-commerce, and brand integration.
Once completed, the client will benefit from:
Ensono’s strategic partnership with this client also played a key role in AWS securing a large, eight-figure, multi-year Private Pricing Agreement (PPA).
Frequently Asked Questions:
How do CIOs unify IT across multiple retail brands after a merger without disrupting stores or e-commerce?
The most effective post-merger IT integrations start with stabilization, not transformation. In this engagement, Ensono first stabilized operations for the newly merged retailer—renegotiating a costly virtualization contract and providing managed services—before designing a target architecture on AWS. A “migration factory” model then moved 10,000 VMs in waves timed around retail blackout windows, keeping 1,800 stores and e-commerce channels running for 60+ million customers throughout the transition.
What’s the best way to exit VMware or a legacy hypervisor after a merger drives up licensing costs?
CIOs facing escalating hypervisor licensing costs typically have three options: renegotiate, replace, or re-platform to the cloud. The most cost-effective path is usually a hybrid: renegotiate short-term to buy time, then migrate the majority of workloads to a public cloud like AWS while standing up a replacement hypervisor for workloads that must remain on-premises. This retailer is projected to save $50M+ over ten years using exactly this approach, with AWS funding offsetting 100% of transition costs.
How do retail CIOs deliver merger synergies on the timeline the board expects?
Boards typically expect IT synergies within 18–36 months of a merger close, but internal teams are usually consumed by day-one integration work. Bringing in a partner to run the modernization program—covering discovery, business case, migration execution, and data center consolidation—lets internal teams stay focused on loyalty, e-commerce, and brand integration while synergy targets are hit in parallel. In this engagement, Ensono is delivering $50M+ in projected savings and consolidating seven data centers into one.
How can a retailer fund a large-scale cloud migration without a major capital outlay?
Hyperscaler migration funding programs—like AWS Migration Acceleration Program (MAP) credits and Private Pricing Agreements (PPAs)—can offset most or all of the cost of a migration when orchestrated by a partner with the right competencies. In this case, Ensono’s AWS partnership secured migration funding that covered 100% of transition costs, and the engagement contributed to AWS closing a large eight-figure, multi-year PPA with the retailer.
What technology foundation do merged retailers need to enable unified loyalty, personalization, and AI?
A unified loyalty program or AI-driven personalization strategy requires consolidated data, standardized infrastructure, and modern APIs—none of which exist naturally after a merger of brands with separate stacks. The prerequisite is a single, modernized platform: consolidated data centers, a common cloud foundation (AWS in this case), and a modernized application estate. Ensono’s engagement is delivering exactly that foundation, positioning the retailer to pursue AI and mainframe modernization as the next phase.
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