BITSUMMIT moved Waterloo Public Library from VMware to a Microsoft-native Hyper-V platform with a validation-led, staged migration that reduced licensing pressure.
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Waterloo Public Library needed a way off rising VMware renewal costs, but it could not put frontline services at risk to get there. The environment was substantial and tightly coupled: a three-node VMware cluster running 43 virtual machines, with roughly 10TB of storage, all sitting on a single datastore volume.
That single-volume arrangement is what raised the stakes. With everything on one datastore, there was little margin for error if anything went sideways during cutover and validation. What the library needed was a move that was controlled, testable, and proven step by step on low-risk workloads before scaling beyond them.
BITSUMMIT delivered a phased VMware-to-Hyper-V migration built to take risk off the table early, prove stability at each stage, and leave Waterloo Public Library on a Microsoft-native platform it could scale.
Discovery and migration planning
The team assessed the existing VMware environment across compute, networking, storage, and VM inventory, then produced a migration plan with defined sequencing, validation checkpoints, and rollback considerations, all aligned to the library's operational windows.
Hyper-V platform build
BITSUMMIT built and configured the Hyper-V host on available infrastructure and prepared networking and storage so workloads could transition cleanly, confirming the platform was ready before any production VM moved.
Staged transitions with validation gates
A pilot set of non-critical virtual machines moved first, proving the approach in a low-risk way, and stability was confirmed after each stage through post-migration testing, cleanup, and tuning, so every next step rested on evidence rather than assumption.
Documentation and handover
BITSUMMIT delivered as-configured documentation and knowledge-transfer sessions, leaving the internal team able to manage the environment confidently and continue the migration with a repeatable playbook.
The engagement gave Waterloo Public Library a future-ready virtualization foundation and a real path away from its VMware dependency. A Microsoft-native Hyper-V platform is now established for long-term scalability, and the staged migration process was proven in the live environment through the successful transition of a pilot set of non-critical workloads before expanding further.
Moving off the VMware renewal treadmill toward a Microsoft-aligned platform model eased the licensing cost pressure that started the project, and a cleaner, Microsoft-native management approach, backed by documented handover, simplified ongoing operations for the internal team.
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