A sponsored research study finds that 70 percent of enterprises are concerned or extremely concerned about the complexity of the Microsoft Exchange migration effort. The study, conducted by Osterman Research and sponsored by Microsoft email and collaboration competitor PostPath, found almost the same level of concern with regards to the amount of time the Exchange migration will take. Free report at the PostPath site.

The findings of the survey are summarized in a brief titled "E-mail Migration Trends and Challenges". The results indicate that while Microsoft Exchange 2007 has some key benefits, many enterprise customers are concerned that the migration process will be complex and costly and take many months to complete.

The survey was conducted with enterprises that have an average of 6,636 e-mail users. Of those surveyed, 67 percent indicated that they intend to make an investment in e-mail servers, either for upgrades or migration to a new e-mail server, sometime this year.

In the study, 59% of organizations indicated that messaging storage growth is also a serious or very serious problem, and 44% have not allocated budget to meet e-discovery or compliance requirements.

"The survey highlights the fact that many organizations are hungry for an alternative solution to Exchange 2007," said Michael Osterman, principal of Osterman Research. "E-mail server solutions that can increase performance, reduce costs, and support a variety of compliance and mobility requirements should be seriously considered."

Migration seen as complex

Nearly one-half of organizations surveyed plan to begin their migration to the latest version of Exchange by spring 2007 or have already begun the migration process. Two-thirds of organizations surveyed also plan to migrate to Outlook 2007 at the same time. However, slightly more than one-half of organizations are not aware that Outlook 2007 now requires a separate Client Access License (CAL) and is no longer included in the Exchange CAL as with previous versions of Exchange. Osterman Research believes that this will present a roadblock for many organizations because it makes the migration to Exchange 2007 more costly than it would be if previous licensing practices were still in place.

The survey concludes that many organizations are most concerned about the complexity of the migration effort (mentioned by 70% as an issue about which they are concerned or extremely concerned), the amount of time that the migration will require (69%), and the cost of the migration (66%).

Estimated cost of migrating

Osterman Research believes that the cost of migrating to Exchange will become a more important issue moving forward as larger numbers of Exchange-enabled organizations take up the task of evaluating Exchange 2007. For example, Osterman Research has built a cost model that demonstrates the cost of migrating to Exchange 2007 for a 5,000-seat organization can be as high as $244 per user, a significant investment for many organizations. Even when amortized over a three-year period, the average cost of an Exchange 2007 migration can be $6.79 per seat per month for a 5,000-seat organization.

Messaging storage issues

About one-half of organizations surveyed currently provide up to 500 megabytes of messaging-related storage per user, although nearly one-half provide more than 500 megabytes. However, decision-makers anticipate that storage per user will increase during the next 12 months.

59% of organizations indicated that messaging storage growth is a serious or very serious problem. Spam, lengthening backup times, and increasing attachment sizes are also considered very serious problems and contribute significantly to the growth in messaging storage.

Despite the recent amendment to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP), it has become apparent that many enterprises are not adequately prepared to meet these new electronic discovery requirements. Forty-four percent of companies surveyed have not allocated budget to meet e-discovery or compliance requirements, even though 75 percent of all legal actions involve the discovery of e-mail.

About this study

Visit the PostPath website to download the Osterman Research study. Registration required.

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