Pariveda Migrates GameStop Retail Data Center to AWS

GRAPEVINE, Texas, May 3, 2017

GameStop enlisted the help of Pariveda Solutions, an AWS Partner Network (APN) Premier Consulting Partner, to architect and lead the data center migration, automate cloud infrastructure and software deployments, and transform team processes with DevOps. GameStop made the decision to migrate its domestic retail data center after a prior successful migration of its international retail systems proved that AWS would better support GameStop business goals with flexible, cost effective infrastructure.

When migration planning began, GameStop IT reviewed its retail systems portfolio and identified opportunities to improve the effectiveness of its teams through emerging technologies and practices. The GameStop domestic systems portfolio included strategic investments in Microsoft Windows and Microsoft SQL Server, but many of the installed systems were on older versions and limited GameStop's ability to use the latest Microsoft operating system and database features.  Therefore, as part of its move to AWS, GameStop decided to deploy the latest version of the Windows operating system and upgrade its SQL Server database management fleet to Microsoft SQL Server 2016.

The Microsoft upgrade plan was significant in scope. "Normally, an effort to upgrade GameStop's database systems would constitute its own project." said John Schoonover, Director of Enterprise Technology. "Through collaboration, deliberate planning, and Pariveda's expertise, our team quickly evaluated and upgraded to Microsoft SQL 2016 on AWS."  The team installed, configured, and confirmed key systems and processes in a matter of weeks.

The upgrade effort required identifying edge cases and validating compatibility across an array of custom and commercial applications.  As part of the cloud migration process, the team developed AWS CloudFormation templates to deploy Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) instances and used Chef and PowerShell to automate the configuration of SQL Server 2016 clusters.  The result was an automated AWS DevOps process for managing Microsoft workloads. 

The collaborative process between GameStop and Pariveda Solutions equipped GameStop with the knowledge to modernize its operation and innovate rapidly on its migration journey to the cloud.