The Commonwealth of Virginia reduces costs and complexity with Microsoft 365

Precision migration with 99.99% accuracy

NTT DATA has a long history of collaborating with Microsoft to deliver innovative, high-performance business solutions. When NTT DATA began working with VITA, the team designed and deployed integrations between the state agencies’ Google Workspace and Microsoft 365 platforms to support the Commonwealth. But when the new governor took the helm, VITA and NTT DATA were tasked to reduce complexity and licensing costs by moving all agencies to Microsoft 365 hosted on Microsoft Azure.

Each state agency has unique needs, so NTT DATA designed the migrations to ensure alignment with their specific missions. NTT DATA worked with each agency, one at a time, steadily migrating users to the platform.

In less than a year, the team migrated over 72,000 user accounts and 1.6 billion objects with 99.99% accuracy.

The agencies appreciate the partnership and the seamlessness of the transition. "NTT DATA's work with the Commonwealth's agencies showcased unparalleled efficiency and a tailored approach,” says the Commonwealth’s Chief Information Officer, Bob Osmond. “The team raised the bar for performance and service."

Improved communication, collaboration and compliance

Commonwealth agencies now have unified access to Microsoft collaboration tools like SharePoint, Teams, and OneDrive, as well as productivity tools like Power Automate and Power BI. The switch to Microsoft 365 also enables the agencies to manage reporting efficiently and to comply with Virginia Freedom of Information Act requests — without incurring additional third-party costs.

“With our new platform in place, our Commonwealth agencies can now collaborate more effectively, enhancing productivity through streamlined communication,” says Osmond.

Unified data and email protection

Before its consolidation onto Microsoft 365, inconsistent data security policies exposed the Commonwealth to cyber threats, but now VITA has strengthened security with policies that cover data loss prevention, encryption and protection against phishing, spam and malware.

The Commonwealth’s email is protected using Cloudflare Area 1 in conjunction with Microsoft 365. In a study of 22 million emails routed through the Commonwealth in a 30-day period, 10% were blocked as malicious — protecting the Commonwealth and its data in real time.

Reduced licensing and storage costs

Rationalizing application licenses to reduce IT costs was one of the goals of the migration project. The migration team evaluated existing license use and identified underutilized licenses for release. This effort saved the Commonwealth nearly $1 million in annual reoccurring costs.

Migrating to Microsoft 365 also reduces data storage costs. By moving VITA’s network storage to cloud-based OneDrive accounts, the Commonwealth can save hundreds of thousands of dollars monthly on storage costs alone.

Continued partnership for success

NTT DATA continues to support VITA with insights, training and strategies to deliver more benefits from the migration. The team established new policies and procedures to enhance collaboration. All training and reference documents are housed in VITA’s ServiceNow platform for future reference.

VITA plans to capture additional efficiencies and cost savings by replacing agency voice-over IP (VoIP) phones with Microsoft Teams calling. Other efforts are underway to leverage Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Intune to streamline mobile device management.

“NTT DATA has been phenomenal at understanding our business, and they’ve been extremely flexible, quickly adapting to our needs,” says Osmond. “Their approach to the transition was consistent, and they took the time to listen to us and understand our needs — which was crucial to the project's success.”