How to Modernize: From Traditional to Cloud Native Virtualization

For many enterprises, past investments in virtualization eventually impose limitations on current operations. Increasingly, teams are becoming dependent on platforms that no longer support the pace or direction of their business. Rising costs further exacerbate these frustrations; annual renewals that are two, three or even ten times higher are becoming commonplace for infrastructure leaders.

Infrastructure modernization may seem daunting, but it is essential for maintaining agility and long-term resilience. With a well-planned strategy, you can regain control over where workloads run, how fast changes can be made and how well systems respond to evolving demands.

Key Takeaways:

• Traditional virtualization splits VMs and containers across separate tools and compliance paths, while cloud native virtualization unifies them on one platform.
• When you can move and scale workloads without the risk of stalled production, you can better optimize for cost, compliance and performance.
• SUSE’s white paper, How cloud native virtualization powers legacy to the leading edge, can help you navigate the move beyond traditional virtualization.

Does traditional virtualization pose risks to modern operations?

Infrastructure teams are sometimes caught between two operational models. Virtual machines may support essential legacy workloads, while containers drive modern applications. Teams become stuck with two sets of tooling, two workflows and two compliance paths.

Separately managing these environments creates inefficiencies and drives up costs. This approach inherently requires higher operating expenses. It also slows delivery and increases risk, especially as release cycles stall as handoffs multiply. Compliance reviews often stretch across duplicate toolchains, and lean engineering teams may be trapped in constant catchup routines. 

This kind of infrastructure lacks the architectural adaptability that hybrid IT demands. As a result, workload mobility can shrink while lock-in risks grow. In addition, traditional stacks are starting to come up short when leadership asks for new AI pilots or increased edge readiness.

A unified platform for virtual machines and containers

What’s the best way to get started with this kind of modernization? A more flexible approach begins with consolidation. 

Many cloud native virtualization platforms provide a single control plane that supports both virtual machines and containers. These platforms enable workloads to run across bare metal, cloud and edge environments. Most follow a hyperconverged infrastructure pattern by default and pack compute, storage and networking into every node. This allows capacity to grow simply by adding another server. 

When a platform has open source foundations, it is more likely to promote transparency and portability. Solutions like SUSE Virtualization help minimize the risk of being constrained by proprietary tooling or siloed architectures. With these types of platforms, teams achieve deployment consistency and retain the flexibility to shift strategy without rewriting infrastructure. In addition, some virtualization solutions use a subscription-based, pay-as-you-grow model that helps to minimize surprise costs.

When evaluating virtualization options, many infrastructure leaders look for a few specific capabilities:

• Support for live migrations that can minimize impact on business operations, helping you manage related risks
• The ability to deploy across hybrid environments, increasing the potential for continued alignment of the platform with future business needs 
• Open and vendor-neutral standards, which help you reduce lock-in

Three ways to minimize migration disruptions

Change is never easy, but it doesn’t have to be risky. With the right virtualization software, migration can be much more predictable and much less disruptive. The key is combining a clear process with tools that simplify complexity. A typical path includes:

1. Remove the initial workload set: Identify a representative slice of virtual machines. Prioritize the ones with low interdependencies to begin migrating your low hanging fruit. Offload their activity during maintenance windows or periods of low usage.
2. Migrate onto a unified platform: Use the built-in tools of the virtualization layer to move workloads directly. This can be done without rebooting or modifying the guest operating system.
3. Validate and cut over: First, confirm that monitoring, backup policies and performance benchmarks are met. Once verified, update system-of-records and the domain name system. Optional rollback plans should remain in place, even though they may go unused.

These steps can help keep mission-critical services online while allowing for steady progress. In many cases, you can bridge old and new without any major retraining efforts or risky switchover events. Going forward, regular release cadences, FIPS-validated cryptographic modules and auto-generated software bills of materials will provide auditors with the documentation they need.

The real-world impact of workload mobility

For the following organizations, virtualization-related modernization allowed for OPEX cuts and led to increased speed and stability. 

At BMW, a cloud native virtualization platform now powers more than 2.6 million virtual machine operations per month. Production workloads are distributed across edge and centralized environments, and they are coordinated through a unified control plane. New edge clusters come online in minutes rather than days, and teams follow the same playbook across BMW’s global network of plants. 

Child Rescue Coalition, a nonprofit focused on child protection, recently consolidated their virtual machine management and container management activities. As a result, a four-person engineering team achieved a fivefold productivity gain. The new, unified platform supports 99.99% uptime, giving CRC confidence that critical services will stay online. Because of this infrastructure modernization, the team can now invest more time in projects that expand the organization’s mission impact.

Across sectors, many enterprises are capturing similar value through a unified virtualization layer. In a recent IDC study, organizations using SUSE Rancher Prime with SUSE Virtualization saw a 258% return on investment. They achieved $3.4 million in average annual benefits, including a 35% reduction in IT infrastructure costs.

Efficiently move from legacy to the leading edge

Looking ahead, platform leaders must accommodate growing AI workloads, increasingly distributed analytics and more real-time data processing at the edge. To stay competitive, your infrastructure must flex to meet these demands without costly reinvention. A well-planned investment in infrastructure modernization can support both near-term performance gains and long-term operational excellence.

Open source virtualization solutions that embrace Cloud Native Computing Foundation principles can further enhance portability and flexibility. An open, cloud-native virtualization layer can help you standardize tooling across architectures, shorten release cycles and boost hardware utilization. It lets you choose where workloads live and how fast they evolve — no vendor lock-in required. 

SUSE Virtualization can help power your transition from legacy to leading edge. Download our white paper to learn more.

Cloud Native Virtualization FAQs

What is cloud native virtualization, and how is it different from traditional virtualization?

Cloud native virtualization runs virtual machines through Kubernetes and cloud-native tooling, using the same control plane, APIs and automation as containers. Traditional virtualization typically relies on hypervisors with separate stacks and workflows, which can limit workload mobility and increase operating costs.

How can I decrease the surprise costs of  virtualization licensing and subscriptions?

Start by auditing actual usage and eliminating any unused licenses and hosts. Next, where possible, reduce exposure by standardizing on portable architectures and piloting more flexible contracts for new workloads.

What are the risks of moving VMs into a Kubernetes-native virtualization platform?

Modernization efforts can introduce risk, such as downtime and audit pain, especially if you do not conduct inventory, dependencies or rollback planning and related validation testing.