Migrate From Box to OneDrive for Business During an M&A

Migrate From Box to OneDrive

Are you planning to migrate from Box to OneDrive for your business’s upcoming M&A (merger/acquisition) project? To ensure 100% success, you must factor in all the challenges and strategize accordingly.

In this article, we have shared advanced actionable insights to help you migrate users and data from Box to OneDrive Business when undergoing a merger or an acquisition.

Key Takeaways:

  • M&A-led Box to OneDrive migration often has several challenges, such as differences in file/folder naming conventions, folder path lengths, special characters, user roles, and more.
  • It is important to partner with a cloud migration solutions provider like CloudFuze that are experienced in M&A migrations.
  • Migrating in sync with the M&A timeline is important for a successful M&A integration.
  • Making changes to user hierarchy according to the M&A scope is also crucial.
  • Merging email and chat platforms is a big part of M&A-led cloud migrations.
  • Preserving hyperlinks during M&A-driven Box to OneDrive Business migration is just as important.
  • Communication and support strategies, such as setting up helpdesks, is critical to migration success.
  • Training users and providing them with Microsoft 365 adoption resources helps streamline the post-migration integration process.

Challenges of Migrating from Box to OneDrive Business During an M&A

The differences in Box and OneDrive for Business create several technical challenges, such as varying limitations for file/folder name characters, folder path length, supported file type, differences in user roles, and more.

To overcome all the limitations and align the Box to Microsoft 365 migration project with the M&A, it is critical to get clarity into the key prerequisites and strategize the project accordingly. Equally important is to partner with a migration solutions provider that has rich experience in M&A-led migrations.

M&A-Led Box to OneDrive for Business Migration Insights

Here are some of the actionable insights we have drawn from our years of experience in helping large enterprises and SMBs (small, medium businesses) with their M&A migrations:

Migrating Users and Data in Sync with the M&A Timeline

Keeping up with the planned timeline is key in most M&As as completing the merger/acquisition project on time is one of the core indicators of success. The entire IT team and other stakeholders involved in the migration planning must have clarity on the M&A timeframe and plan the migration timeline accordingly.

And when planning the migration timeline, it is crucial to understand the estimated time to migrate the finalized list of users and data. If variables such as volume of user data, token access, data encryption, and nested files/folders cause the migration to exceed the timeline, it is best to run parallel instances concurrently.

Planning M&A migration timeline

Adhering to the User Hierarchy and Folder Structure of the Target Company

When consolidating the work environments of both companies during an M&A, it is crucial that the target company adjusts its environment to the intricacies of the acquirer’s environment, with user hierarchy being one of the most critical aspects.

Interestingly, IT teams can avoid the heavy lifting in strategizing user mapping from Box to SharePoint Online and OneDrive as the existing user hierarchy of the acquirer should inform the decisions. Apart from consolidating user roles and permissions accordingly, it may also be necessary to make relevant modifications to the folder structures.

Mapping folders

Merging Email Systems in a Comprehensive Way

Although user accounts and data are the core aspects of any migration, other vital aspects of the cloud work environments, such as email systems and whiteboards, cannot be overlooked. And when migrating emails to the destination cloud environment, it is crucial to move them comprehensively with metadata and associated features, including:

  • Contacts
  • Calendar syncs
  • Tasks
  • Email groups
  • Notes
  • Distribution lists
  • Shared mailboxes

Preserving Links and Making Them Accessible to the Target Company

Retaining the integrity of links is a technical feat to achieve in migrations of any size, and M&A projects add more to the complexity as the target company’s teams must also have access to them. Link migration tools that consolidate with the standard user and data migration, such as CloudFuze Hyperlink Fixer, help ease the IT teams of both companies to migrate links in ways that make business sense as per the M&A goals.

With a feature-rich hyperlink migration tool like CloudFuze Hyperlink Fixer, IT teams can: 

  • Migrate links in high volume without breaking them
  • Repairing broken links and making them accessible to the target company

Setting up a Dedicated Help Desk to Address Both Company’s Concerns

Getting communications right is one of the crucial elements of migration success during an M&A. Proper communication is important not just when the migration is in progress but also when validating the migrated accounts, data, emails, links, chat messages, and whiteboards. And one of the best ways to bridge migration communication gaps is setting up a helpdesk dedicated solely for the M&A migration project.

With CloudFuze as a strategic M&A cloud office migration partner, companies and their IT teams can set up a dedicated help desk for 24/7 enterprise-grade priority support.

Streamlining Microsoft 365 Adoption Within the Acquiring Company

During an M&A, the target company users need to adapt to the destination cloud environment (Microsoft 365 in this case) in ways specific to the workflow of the acquiring company. Therefore, it is crucial to build a repository of Microsoft 365 adoption resources while aligning the onboarding processes to match the overall setup of the acquiring company’s Microsoft 365 environment.

Migrate From Box to OneDrive for Business During an M&A with CloudFuze

At CloudFuze, we have unmatched expertise in enabling M&A-led migrations, including Box to OneDrive and SharePoint migrations. We have helped some of the world’s largest and most popular companies like Adenza, Stryker, etc., migrate during their M&A successfully.

Get in touch with us to learn more about our expertise in M&A migrations.

M&A Migration Case Study

Adenza, a leading fintech company, wanted to perform an acquisition-driven Box to Microsoft 365 migration. They also aimed to improve operational efficiency and data governance with the migration.

To address the challenge of migrating more than 1000 user accounts, segregate centralized ownership in Box, and more, they turned to us. Our team helped them overcome all the challenges and enabled them to make the migration a resounding success! Read the full case study.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. How to perform a merger and acquisition migration?

Partnering with a cloud migration solutions provider like CloudFuze is one of the most important steps. Equally important is to plan the migration to align with the M&A objectives, roadmap, and timeline.

2. What is the best way to migrate from Box to OneDrive for Business?

The best way is to use an advanced Box to OneDrive migration tool from providers like CloudFuze. The tool you choose should be able to migrate a high volume of users and data without downtime while accurately preserving metadata.

3. Is merger and acquisition a common use case in cloud migrations?

Yes. Mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, and spin-offs are some of the common reasons why large enterprises and SMBs migrate from one cloud platform to another. Other common migration use cases include cost savings, consolidation, cloud governance, and digital and AI transformation.

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