UniQ is also a Microsoft partner with Silver Competency in Cloud Productivity as well as Small & Mid-Market Solutions and was recently recognized by Lenovo as a 2020 Smart Office Expert Specialist.

In a recent partner interview with Principal Consultant James Ooi, BitTitan had the chance to chat more about UniQ’s migration business, the impacts of COVID-19, and why MigrationWIz is an integral part of their migration practice.

BitTitan: Both of our organizations focus heavily on the Modern Workplace – helping users and businesses get to and be successful in the cloud. What sets UniQ apart from other MSPs when it comes to migrations?

James: It really comes down to experience. Our team has at least 15 years covering all kinds of systems, from legacy on-prem Exchange servers to cross platform migrations from sources like Lotus Notes and Novell Groupwise. As more organizations have moved to the cloud, we’ve seen opportunities to migrate across cloud platforms, such as from G Suite to Office 365. Being able to support these different scenarios helps us serve a wider base of customers and adds to that experience component.

We also have a very strong project delivery methodology ensuring the projects delivered are of high quality while minimizing disruption to end-users. A key part of that plan is close interaction and partnership with our customers at all levels, from top management to each end-user.

Last but not least – having to understand help the actual users using the platform is where our forte lies. As many organizations struggle ‘culture shock’ after transitioning from one platform to another. With BitTitan, this smoothen the entire process and minimize the resistance of ‘change’ from the start.

When looking back over the COVID-19 pandemic, what has been the biggest effect on your customers and migration projects?

During this pandemic, we’re seeing companies find various ways to cut costs and optimize resources. The focus has shifted from capital expenses to operational expenses. Amidst a lot of uncertainty, companies are opting for the most affordable solutions and services. Many have recognized that migrating existing workloads to the cloud helps with OPEX, and there is certainly priority to do this in the fastest manner possible.

There are several tools UniQ could choose from to support these migrations. Why go with MigrationWiz?

We have tried many of those tools, from first-party solutions to third-party tools. What we have found over our years of experience, however, is that MigrationWiz offers the best support for the entire migration suite, it’s easy to use, and the value of bundling workloads together with a single license through a single tool. The documentation is ready and accessible when we need to reference. Most of all, the full automation from server side to client endpoint helps expedite project setup and actual data transfer.

Is there a recent project where that value was really clear?

Our most recent migration involved a 100-user migration for a financial services company here in Malaysia, which is a key vertical for us. We have several financial services customers, which I would call our strongest single area in terms of verticals.

This customer need to decouple existing IT services from their parent company and stand up an independent infrastructure governed by a local IT team. This included migrating users from the existing Active Directory, migrate email services from Exchange 2010 to Exchange Online, enable Teams and Enterprise Telephone, and more. It was a full transformation and rollout of Office 365 Enterprise Apps, Windows 10 Enterprise, and additional IP protection.

The project was awarded right before the pandemic really appeared here in Malaysia. We were fortunate that MigrationWiz is a cloud service that doesn’t require any on-premises servers. With this tool and a project plan, we were able to seamlessly migrate email content and users’ Outlook profiles without needing to attend to the customer physically as most of them were working from home during the lockdown.