10 Enterprise-Level Challenges to Switch to OneDrive from Box

Enterprises that switch to OneDrive from Box run into recurring challenges, such as mapping thousands of user accounts, handling unsupported file names, preserving metadata and context, managing API throttling limits, meeting security and compliance requirements, converting Box Notes, lowering downtime risks, consolidating multiple cloud platforms during M&A, streamlining change management, and governing post migration.

This guide explores each challenge and provides solutions on how enterprises can solve them to be able to switch to OneDrive (and Microsoft 365) from Box Smoothly and securely.

1. User Mapping

In an enterprise-level Box migration to OneDrive, thousands of user account data must be moved from Box to OneDrive, where not all user accounts are active. Therefore, it is critical to segregate only the active and required user accounts and map them to the target cloud.

Doing this manually means cross-referencing the user list, checking last login activity, and manually assigning each account to its OneDrive counterpart. And when you have thousands of users to migrate, this can take weeks of admin work.

CloudFuze helps automate user mapping at a granular level and saves the IT admin team a lot of time and effort.

2. Unsupported Special Characters and File/Folder Names

OneDrive does not support some special characters like ” *: < >? / \ | in file or folder names. It also restricts file or folder names that contain these terms: .lock, CON, PRN, AUX, NUL, COM0 – COM9, LPT0 – LPT9, _vti_, desktop.ini, and any filename starting with ~$ and limits the file path length to 400 characters.

As a result, Box files containing these characters in the file names go into conflict when you migrate data to OneDrive. And when migrating at large enterprise scale, the conflict can create disruption and downtime.

CloudFuze’s in-built feature overcomes this issue by automatically replacing the special characters with a hyphen (-) or an underscore (_) and trimming any extra characters in the file path to be within the limit of 400.

Our managed migration team also ensures that the restricted file names do not appear during the migration process.

3. Preserving Metadata and Context

When it comes to replicating the source environment in the destination platform, it’s not just migrating files but also the metadata wrapped around them. These metadata and context include:

• Sharing permissions
• Embedded links
• External sharing
• Timestamps
• File version history
• In-line comments
• Shared links

Losing these metadata during migration creates real business problems as the collaboration context between individual users and teams will be lost.

Manually recreating this for thousands of files isn’t realistic. CloudFuze’s migration engine retains all types of metadata and context during the transfer. This way, the files that land in OneDrive match the ones that are left Box.

4. API Throttling Risks

Both Box and Microsoft enforce API rate limits to protect their platforms from overload. When an enterprise migration tries to move a large volume of data very quickly, it hits those limits and the migration stalls or fails outright.

This problem becomes specifically amplified at large-scale migrations. Compared to small migration that rarely have API-throttling risks, a large enterprise migration involving terabytes and petabytes of data can hit them constantly unless the migration tool can automatically manage it.

CloudFuze Migrate automatically slows down transfer speeds as it detects approaching API limits on either platform. Proven methodologies, such as migrating users in batches, also helps avoid API throttling and downtime risks.

5. Data Security and Compliance

Migrating enterprise data means moving sensitive information, such as financial records, health data, government contracts, etc., depending on the industry. It is important that the sensitive data is migrated securely.

Enterprises in regulated industries like finance, healthcare, and government industry also frequently require the migration to run through privately controlled infrastructure rather than shared public servers.

Therefore, it is important for enterprises to partner with cloud migration vendors like CloudFuze that ensure end-to-end security. CloudFuze follows all the required security measures to ensure optimal data protection, including:

• Encryption of data in transit and at rest throughout the migration
• Secure source and destination cloud authentication through OAuth 2.0
• Dedicated enterprise-grade instances for secure data transfer
• SOC 2 Type 2, GDPR, and ISO 27001 compliance

6. Box Notes Compatibility

Box Notes are word processing files exclusive to Box cloud that do not exist in other clouds like OneDrive. So, transferring Box Notes to OneDrive is a technical challenge that needs to be addressed.

CloudFuze automatically converts Box Notes into .DOCX Microsoft Word files, retaining the same permissions and file features while migrating it to OneDrive. In addition, it helps in quick transfer of data within the planned migration timeline.

7. Migration Downtime Risks

When moving thousands of users and terabytes and petabytes of data to OneDrive from Box at an enterprise scale, the risk of downtime is high. Right from the sheer scale of users and data size to optimal performance and consistent throughput requirements, ensuring little to no downtime at enterprise-scale migrations requires proven methodologies.

CloudFuze’s proven approaches have helped large global enterprises such as Warner Bros. Discovery, Boston Medical Center, Teach for America, etc., migrate without downtime.

To mitigate downtime, CloudFuze’s strategic approaches include:

• Having clarity on the available API calls before starting the migration.
• Migrating users in segregated batches.
• Using dedicated and enterprise-grade instances for optimal performance.
• Validating each batch as and when it gets migrated. If any files or folders go into conflict, this approach helps ensure that the conflict does not pile up in the next batches.

8. Multi-Tenant Consolidation for Mergers and Acquisition

M&A-driven Box to OneDrive migrations often have more complexity to it. They can often involve not just one but multiple source clouds of which Box can be part of it. In these types of multi-cloud migration scenarios, mapping users and permissions can often be a challenge.

The best way to navigate this complexity is to align user mapping and migration scoping tasks with the overall goals of the merger or acquisition. It is equally important to have clarity on the type of replication needed in OneDrive and Microsoft 365 suite that will align with the merger or acquisition goals.

9. Change Management

When switching to OneDrive from Box at an enterprise scale, making the transition smooth for a high volume of users can be complex and challenging. The best way to do this is to have a proper change management plan.

When working on the change management plan, make sure to focus on these critical tasks:

• Communicate about the cloud platform transition to the users.
• Define and establish proper points of contact, such as project managers, escalation point of contact, etc.
• Provide proper training to the users to enable them to adopt Microsoft 365 smoothly

10. Post-Migration Governance

In many cases, IT teams miss out on planning for the post-migration stage. As usage grows in the destination cloud platform, issues such as sprawl, shadow IT, shadow AI, etc., are bound to happen.

Therefore, it is important to plan for post-migration governance with tools like CloudFuze Manage that ensure end-to-end governance of the entire Microsoft 365 environment.

Overcome Challenges when Switching to OneDrive from Box with CloudFuze

Leverage CloudFuze’s proven methodologies to mitigate challenges and ensure all users and data get migrated from Box to OneDrive smoothly and securely. We have expertise in Box to OneDrive migrations for all types of use cases, complexity, and sizes.

Contact us today for a free and no-obligation migration consultation.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What are the biggest challenges when switching from Box to OneDrive?

The biggest challenges are mapping users at scale, preserving complex metadata and context, migrating embedded links without breakage, mitigating API throttling risks, converting Box Notes files to supported formats, and more.

2. How long does an enterprise Box to OneDrive migration take?

Timeline depends on data volume, number of users, metadata complexity, number of embedded links, and whether the migration involves consolidating multiple cloud platforms.

3. What happens to permissions after migrating from Box to OneDrive?

This depends on the migration tool you use. A basic file transfer can strip permissions entirely while a purpose-built tool like CloudFuze Migrate preserves sharing permissions of root and inner-level folders and files. This way, permissions behave in similar ways in OneDrive as they did in the Box.