The worst legacy modernisation strategy is a big-bang rewrite. The second worst is doing nothing. The right approach is almost always incremental: strangling the old system piece by piece, migrating functionality in order of value and risk, and running old and new in parallel until confidence is established. We've done this many times.
What we deliver
Legacy assessment. We assess existing systems to understand what they actually do, how they do it, and where the risk lies. This means reading code, tracing data flows, mapping integrations, cataloguing undocumented behaviour, and identifying the components that are genuinely problematic versus the ones that work fine and should be left alone.
Modernisation strategy. We produce migration roadmaps that balance business value, technical risk, and team capacity. Each phase delivers working software - not intermediate states that require further work before anyone benefits. We sequence migrations so that high-risk, high-value components move first and low-value components are deprioritised or retired.
Strangler fig implementation. We implement facade layers that route traffic between old and new systems, migrating functionality incrementally without service interruption. New features are built on the new platform, existing features are migrated in priority order, and the old system shrinks until it can be decommissioned.
Database migration. Schema redesign, data migration scripts, dual-write patterns, read-replica approaches. We migrate data without downtime using change data capture, event-driven sync, and verification pipelines that confirm data integrity at every step.
Framework and platform upgrades. .NET Framework to .NET Core/.NET 8+, legacy Umbraco versions to current LTS, on-premises to cloud, monolith to modular architecture. We handle the full migration including dependency updates, API changes, and deployment pipeline reconfiguration.
Integration preservation. Legacy systems accumulate integrations over decades. We map every inbound and outbound integration, design compatibility layers where needed, and migrate integration points without breaking upstream or downstream systems.
How we approach risk
Every modernisation decision we make is reversible until we've validated the new implementation in production. We use feature flags, parallel running, shadow traffic, and phased rollouts to prove that the new system behaves correctly before switching over. If something goes wrong, we roll back - no drama.
What we don't do
We don't recommend rewriting systems that work. We don't modernise for its own sake. If a component is stable, well-understood, and meeting its requirements, the right answer is often to leave it alone and focus modernisation effort where it actually matters.
Track record
We've modernised legacy platforms across finance, insurance, retail, automotive, and public sector - including migrations from .NET Framework to modern .NET, on-premises SQL Server to Azure, monolithic CMS platforms to headless architectures, and bespoke systems to standard platforms.