MyBell delivers a better self-serve experience after shifting to AWS cloud
When it comes to customer service, providing a self-serve application is critical to reducing wait times, enhancing the user experience and staying competitive. This makes finding or building applications a priority – and any opportunity to reduce that time and cost is very attractive.
MyBell Mobile is a self-service mobile application that enables Bell customers to manage their accounts, pay bills, monitor data usage and access various mobile services. In order to improve services and respond to the rapidly evolving needs of their customer base, the team behind MyBell saw the opportunity to move the development of app enhancements from on-site technology systems to a cloud-based environment.
With an in-house team of cloud experts at Bell Business Markets, the MyBell team didn’t have far to go. Upon a review of needs and requirements, the cloud team recommended an AWS solution that leveraged Bell’s professional services, ultimately unlocking substantial cost savings. With its cloud environment in place, the team can now quickly create and test new features to enhance the experience of users.
Overcoming on-premises bottlenecks
MyBell realized that, as the development team grew, so too did the demands it put on its current on-premises solution. As it outgrew the platform, developing and testing new app features or fixing bugs became challenging. Without proactive monitoring, the team could not detect server outages, leading to workload redistribution among the remaining servers, which created bottlenecks and reduced operating capacity.
To run the application workloads, the team had been using on-premises Mac Pro servers that were nearing the end of their warranty. Needing more capacity and scalability to meet increased workloads, it decided to invest in a more modern technology stack, powered by a hybrid cloud solution.
To make the move, it needed a cloud solution capable of running Mac workloads and an expert partner to guide it through the migration process.
The cloud experts from the Bell Business Markets team stepped up to the plate and delivered exceptional service to address the challenges their MyBell colleagues were facing.
"The fixed capacity of our existing on-premises infrastructure reduced our options for exploring innovation, evolving the code base or adopting new technology stacks."
— Self-serve development team member at MyBell
Solution: expert advice for a seamless cloud migration
Bell's cloud experts first conducted a migration assessment. This evaluated the feasibility of migrating infrastructure to the cloud based on project requirements, solution architecture and implementation costs. To validate the operations in the cloud, the assessment also provided a step-by-step migration path and a proof-of-concept project plan.
During a one-day cloud maturity assessment workshop, the Bell Cloud team evaluated the overall cloud strategy and provided an objective framework with guidelines to optimize the new solution architecture. The technical workshop also featured a thorough review to align the proposed architecture with MyBell’s internal networking, corporate security and data governance policies.
With the planning and design complete, Bell's next proof-of-concept task was to help clarify SLAs during the AWS onboarding process and to solve configuration challenges like firewall port adjustments and network routing for new AWS regions. As the onboarding process was fine tuned, subsequent firewall requests were faster, and the process became more apparent to the development team.
After the proof-of-concept was complete, Bell Cloud experts had a clear path to create the AWS instances, establish the development pipeline and execute builds. At the same time, they integrated the solution with the company's existing DevOps and Quality (DOQ) stack, which ensured a smooth migration to the AWS cloud without disrupting development activities.
Solution: expert advice for a seamless cloud migration
With the support of Bell’s own cloud experts, the MyBell team has successfully shifted to the cloud. This transition has not only helped it meet increasing customer expectations, but it has also fast-tracked its digital transformation goals.
By accelerating application build times, it reduced the application intervals from 30 minutes to five. Now it can test and release new features faster and bring them to customers sooner.
Additionally, it can now run twice as many hotfix cycles, allowing it to address bugs much faster. These enhancements improved application development speeds by a remarkable 200%.
By transitioning to the AWS Cloud, MyBell has cut down on upfront operating costs and anticipates saving more than $1 million over the next four years.
The move to the AWS cloud has ushered in a new way of working for our team, one characterized by unprecedented agility and scalability.
— Self-serve development team lead at MyBell
What's next?
Thanks to the project's success, the self-serve application development team sees an opportunity to transition this hybrid solution to a fully cloud-based DevOps environment when the remaining 20% of its servers approach end-of-life. This expansion will accelerate the company's overall digital transformation journey by allowing it to explore advanced technologies and use-cases that would be challenging to implement with on-premises infrastructure.
Request a call back or contact your Bell representative for more information on how we can support your cloud journey.