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Service interruption — full feature continuity through cutover
Agent interactions auto-validated for model parity, no manual QA
Heartbeat agent shipped to production before migration completed
Momentum Financial Services Group (MFSG)
North America
Consumer Financial Services
Amazon EC2, AWS Application Migration Service (MGN), AWS Direct Connect, Amazon Transit Gateway, Amazon VPC, AWS Systems Manager (Patch Manager, Session Manager), Amazon CloudWatch, AWS Backup, AWS Single Sign-On, AWS IAM, AWS CloudTrail, AWS Config, Amazon GuardDuty, AWS Security Hub, Amazon Inspector, AWS KMS, Terraform
Momentum Financial Services Group (MFSG), a North American consumer financial services company, operated a non-production environment across 91 virtual machines in an aging co-located data center with no disaster recovery plan, no scheduled backups, and a firm deadline to exit the facility. Avahi conducted a comprehensive cloud migration assessment, designed a future-state AWS architecture, and executed a lift-and-shift migration of all 91 workloads, including over 1,000 databases, to AWS. The engagement delivered a modernized, multi-availability zone cloud environment with automated patching, backup, and monitoring, enabling MFSG to meet its data center exit deadline while significantly improving its operational and security posture.
Momentum Financial Services Group (MFSG) is a North American financial services company offering consumer lending, cheque cashing, and related financial products through a portfolio of retail brands including MoneyMart. With operations across Canada and the United States, MFSG serves a broad customer base through both in-store locations and digital channels. The company runs a complex technology stack supporting public-facing web applications, internal staff tools, and branch terminal systems, all underpinned by a large SQL Server database estate.
MFSG’s non-production environment, comprising 91 virtual machines on VMware in a co-located data center, was approaching end-of-life at its hosting facility. The company faced a hard deadline to exit the facility, creating urgency around a migration that had not yet been planned or designed.
The existing environment compounded the challenge. No backup jobs were scheduled for the non-production VMs, leaving the environment without any recovery capability. No disaster recovery plan existed for this workload tier. Monitoring was limited to basic power-on/off status tracking, with no disk forecasting or performance alerting. All internet traffic for the non-production environment was routed through a separate east data center, creating a dependency that any future-state design would need to address. The environment also lacked network micro-segmentation between workload groups.
Beyond the infrastructure gaps, the environment included 1,016 databases spread across 41 SQL instances, including 15 standalone instances and 26 Always On availability groups, with some database servers holding close to 11 TB of data each. Any migration plan had to account for this database complexity without disrupting ongoing development and testing activity. Without a clear path to the cloud, MFSG risked missing its data center exit deadline and continuing to operate infrastructure with no resilience or recovery posture.
AWS offered MFSG the migration tooling, infrastructure scale, and security services needed to move a large, complex VMware environment with minimal disruption. The AWS Application Migration Service (MGN) enabled automated, agent-based replication of virtual machines directly to Amazon EC2, reducing the manual effort and downtime typically associated with large-scale migrations. AWS’s multi-availability zone architecture gave MFSG an immediate resilience improvement over its single-site on-premises posture. The breadth of native AWS security services, covering threat detection, compliance monitoring, and encryption key management, also addressed MFSG’s requirements as a regulated financial services organization.
As an AWS Premier Tier Services Partner, Avahi brought both the technical depth and the AWS program expertise to lead a migration of this scale within MFSG’s timeline constraints. Avahi’s structured engagement model, covering assessment, architecture design, migration execution, and post-migration support, gave MFSG a single accountable partner across the full project lifecycle.
Avahi’s experience supporting financial services organizations meant the team understood the security requirements, operational continuity expectations, and compliance considerations that come with migrating regulated workloads to the cloud. The engagement was structured under the AWS Migration Acceleration Program (MAP), giving MFSG access to AWS funding and a proven delivery framework.
Avahi began with a thorough assessment of MFSG’s non-production environment, cataloguing all 91 virtual machines, mapping applications to their underlying servers, and documenting the full network architecture, database infrastructure, and security posture. The assessment covered four primary workstreams: foundational AWS account architecture and VPC design; shared services including CI/CD, Active Directory integration, and security platform; database services; and operations including backup and monitoring.
The assessment evaluated two migration strategies: lift-and-shift (re-host) versus modernization (re-platform). Given MFSG’s hard data center exit deadline, Avahi recommended a lift-and-shift approach using AWS Application Migration Service (MGN) to replicate virtual machines directly to Amazon EC2 instances. This approach required no changes to application code or database schemas, minimized risk, and could meet the timeline. A phased modernization was identified as a subsequent opportunity once workloads were stable in the cloud.
For the 1,016 databases across 41 SQL instances, Avahi designed a dual-method migration approach: block-level OS migration using AWS MGN replication agents to preserve server configurations, combined with SQL-native backup-and-restore for granular database-level control. This approach was chosen over managed database services to preserve existing SQL Server configurations, including specialized settings required by the applications.
The future-state architecture was built on a multi-account AWS landing zone deployed with Terraform, using Amazon VPC with private subnets across multiple availability zones and no direct internet access from AWS. AWS Direct Connect provided hybrid connectivity back to the east data center, and AWS Transit Gateway handled inter-VPC and on-premises routing. Active Directory was migrated to Amazon EC2 with replication to the on-premises primary domain controller over Direct Connect, and AWS Single Sign-On was configured to provide centralized identity management across AWS, on-premises, and Azure AD.
A comprehensive security services layer was implemented across the landing zone, incorporating Amazon GuardDuty for threat detection, AWS Security Hub for centralized findings, AWS CloudTrail for API activity logging, AWS Config for resource configuration and compliance tracking, Amazon Inspector for vulnerability assessments, and AWS KMS for encryption key management. Post-migration, Amazon CloudWatch replaced the prior monitoring tool with custom dashboards and alarms covering CPU, memory, disk, and network metrics. AWS Backup replaced the prior state of no scheduled backup coverage, and AWS Systems Manager Patch Manager automated patching across all migrated EC2 instances.
MFSG migrated all 91 non-production virtual machines, including 1,016 databases across 41 SQL instances, from an on-premises VMware environment to AWS, meeting its data center exit deadline. The migration replaced an environment with no disaster recovery plan and no scheduled backups with a multi-availability zone AWS architecture featuring automated backup, centralized monitoring, and automated patching across all workloads.
The TCO analysis produced during the assessment identified a clear cost optimization path: moving from on-demand pricing to reserved or dedicated host instances with BYOL licensing was projected to reduce compute costs by 20 to 25%. The engagement also included four weeks of post-migration hypercare and three months of Avahi MSP coverage, giving MFSG continuity of support through stabilization.
Momentum Financial Services Group (MFSG)
North America
Consumer Financial Services
Amazon EC2, AWS Application Migration Service (MGN), AWS Direct Connect, Amazon Transit Gateway, Amazon VPC, AWS Systems Manager (Patch Manager, Session Manager), Amazon CloudWatch, AWS Backup, AWS Single Sign-On, AWS IAM, AWS CloudTrail, AWS Config, Amazon GuardDuty, AWS Security Hub, Amazon Inspector, AWS KMS, Terraform
Momentum Financial Services Group (MFSG), a North American consumer financial services company, operated a non-production environment across 91 virtual machines in an aging co-located data center with no disaster recovery plan, no scheduled backups, and a firm deadline to exit the facility. Avahi conducted a comprehensive cloud migration assessment, designed a future-state AWS architecture, and executed a lift-and-shift migration of all 91 workloads, including over 1,000 databases, to AWS. The engagement delivered a modernized, multi-availability zone cloud environment with automated patching, backup, and monitoring, enabling MFSG to meet its data center exit deadline while significantly improving its operational and security posture.
Momentum Financial Services Group (MFSG) is a North American financial services company offering consumer lending, cheque cashing, and related financial products through a portfolio of retail brands including MoneyMart. With operations across Canada and the United States, MFSG serves a broad customer base through both in-store locations and digital channels. The company runs a complex technology stack supporting public-facing web applications, internal staff tools, and branch terminal systems, all underpinned by a large SQL Server database estate.
MFSG’s non-production environment, comprising 91 virtual machines on VMware in a co-located data center, was approaching end-of-life at its hosting facility. The company faced a hard deadline to exit the facility, creating urgency around a migration that had not yet been planned or designed.
The existing environment compounded the challenge. No backup jobs were scheduled for the non-production VMs, leaving the environment without any recovery capability. No disaster recovery plan existed for this workload tier. Monitoring was limited to basic power-on/off status tracking, with no disk forecasting or performance alerting. All internet traffic for the non-production environment was routed through a separate east data center, creating a dependency that any future-state design would need to address. The environment also lacked network micro-segmentation between workload groups.
Beyond the infrastructure gaps, the environment included 1,016 databases spread across 41 SQL instances, including 15 standalone instances and 26 Always On availability groups, with some database servers holding close to 11 TB of data each. Any migration plan had to account for this database complexity without disrupting ongoing development and testing activity. Without a clear path to the cloud, MFSG risked missing its data center exit deadline and continuing to operate infrastructure with no resilience or recovery posture.
AWS offered MFSG the migration tooling, infrastructure scale, and security services needed to move a large, complex VMware environment with minimal disruption. The AWS Application Migration Service (MGN) enabled automated, agent-based replication of virtual machines directly to Amazon EC2, reducing the manual effort and downtime typically associated with large-scale migrations. AWS’s multi-availability zone architecture gave MFSG an immediate resilience improvement over its single-site on-premises posture. The breadth of native AWS security services, covering threat detection, compliance monitoring, and encryption key management, also addressed MFSG’s requirements as a regulated financial services organization.
As an AWS Premier Tier Services Partner, Avahi brought both the technical depth and the AWS program expertise to lead a migration of this scale within MFSG’s timeline constraints. Avahi’s structured engagement model, covering assessment, architecture design, migration execution, and post-migration support, gave MFSG a single accountable partner across the full project lifecycle.
Avahi’s experience supporting financial services organizations meant the team understood the security requirements, operational continuity expectations, and compliance considerations that come with migrating regulated workloads to the cloud. The engagement was structured under the AWS Migration Acceleration Program (MAP), giving MFSG access to AWS funding and a proven delivery framework.
Avahi began with a thorough assessment of MFSG’s non-production environment, cataloguing all 91 virtual machines, mapping applications to their underlying servers, and documenting the full network architecture, database infrastructure, and security posture. The assessment covered four primary workstreams: foundational AWS account architecture and VPC design; shared services including CI/CD, Active Directory integration, and security platform; database services; and operations including backup and monitoring.
The assessment evaluated two migration strategies: lift-and-shift (re-host) versus modernization (re-platform). Given MFSG’s hard data center exit deadline, Avahi recommended a lift-and-shift approach using AWS Application Migration Service (MGN) to replicate virtual machines directly to Amazon EC2 instances. This approach required no changes to application code or database schemas, minimized risk, and could meet the timeline. A phased modernization was identified as a subsequent opportunity once workloads were stable in the cloud.
For the 1,016 databases across 41 SQL instances, Avahi designed a dual-method migration approach: block-level OS migration using AWS MGN replication agents to preserve server configurations, combined with SQL-native backup-and-restore for granular database-level control. This approach was chosen over managed database services to preserve existing SQL Server configurations, including specialized settings required by the applications.
The future-state architecture was built on a multi-account AWS landing zone deployed with Terraform, using Amazon VPC with private subnets across multiple availability zones and no direct internet access from AWS. AWS Direct Connect provided hybrid connectivity back to the east data center, and AWS Transit Gateway handled inter-VPC and on-premises routing. Active Directory was migrated to Amazon EC2 with replication to the on-premises primary domain controller over Direct Connect, and AWS Single Sign-On was configured to provide centralized identity management across AWS, on-premises, and Azure AD.
A comprehensive security services layer was implemented across the landing zone, incorporating Amazon GuardDuty for threat detection, AWS Security Hub for centralized findings, AWS CloudTrail for API activity logging, AWS Config for resource configuration and compliance tracking, Amazon Inspector for vulnerability assessments, and AWS KMS for encryption key management. Post-migration, Amazon CloudWatch replaced the prior monitoring tool with custom dashboards and alarms covering CPU, memory, disk, and network metrics. AWS Backup replaced the prior state of no scheduled backup coverage, and AWS Systems Manager Patch Manager automated patching across all migrated EC2 instances.
MFSG migrated all 91 non-production virtual machines, including 1,016 databases across 41 SQL instances, from an on-premises VMware environment to AWS, meeting its data center exit deadline. The migration replaced an environment with no disaster recovery plan and no scheduled backups with a multi-availability zone AWS architecture featuring automated backup, centralized monitoring, and automated patching across all workloads.
The TCO analysis produced during the assessment identified a clear cost optimization path: moving from on-demand pricing to reserved or dedicated host instances with BYOL licensing was projected to reduce compute costs by 20 to 25%. The engagement also included four weeks of post-migration hypercare and three months of Avahi MSP coverage, giving MFSG continuity of support through stabilization.
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