Cloud Migration System for Dynamic Capacity Management

Resolve Bottlenecks,
Find Innovative Solutions
Generate Solutions

Solution Overview

Problem

Datacenters are often overbuilt to handle peak loads, leading to underutilization and high costs, as enterprises struggle to manage capacity efficiently and effectively handle disasters without redundant infrastructure.

Innovation Solution

A cloud migration system that monitors load conditions and automatically moves computing resources between datacenters and cloud-based services, allowing for dynamic capacity management and disaster recovery by detecting thresholds and facilitating orderly migrations to optimize resource usage.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If datacenters are built to handle peak load capacity, then reliability is improved, but cost increases and resources are underutilized

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvecapacity adequacyVSAvoidresource underutilization
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSLoss of energy

Solution Approach 1:

The patent implements dynamic capacity management by enabling workloads to migrate between on-premises datacenters and cloud-based datacenters based on real-time load conditions. This allows the system to adapt its computing capacity dynamically, using local resources during normal operations and cloud resources during peak loads, thereby eliminating the need to permanently over-provision infrastructure for peak scenarios.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #15Dynamics

2Reliability

If redundant infrastructure is built for disaster recovery, then reliability is improved, but cost and complexity increase

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvedisaster recovery capabilityVSAvoidinfrastructure complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent introduces cloud-based datacenters as an intermediary resource pool for disaster recovery purposes. Instead of maintaining duplicate redundant infrastructure on-premises, the system can leverage external cloud datacenters as backup computing resources. This intermediary approach provides disaster recovery capability while reducing the complexity and cost of maintaining duplicate infrastructure.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

3Productivity

If cloud resources are used for peak loads, then resource utilization is improved, but management complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improveresource utilizationVSAvoidsystem management complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
ProductivityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent merges on-premises datacenter management with cloud datacenter management into a unified system. By integrating these previously separate management domains, the system can automatically orchestrate workload migration and resource allocation across both environments, thereby improving resource utilization without proportionally increasing management complexity.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #5Merging (Combining)

Data Source

PatentEP2710461B1Cross-cloud computing for capacity management and disaster recovery
Publication Date: 2023.11.01 MICROSOFT TECHNOLOGY LICENSING LLC
  • EP2710461B1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP2710461B1 patent drawingFigure 2
  • EP2710461B1 patent drawingFigure 3

AI summary

A cloud migration system is described herein that provides capacity management and disaster recovery by detecting peak load conditions and automatically moving computing to another computing resource (and back) and by providing computing across two or more clouds and moving completely to one in the case of a disaster at one site. The system monitors loads within a datacenter and detects a threshold that indicates that the current load is nearing the datacenter's capacity. Upon detecting that the threshold will be reached, the system facilitates an orderly move of at least some datacenter load to another datacenter or cloud-based resources. The system can also be used as a disaster recovery architecture at a datacenter/network level to manage fast workload transition in case of disaster. Thus, the system allows enterprises to build smaller and more efficient datacenters that leverage other resources for rare extra loads.