Project Name
How a Healthcare Network Modernized IT Infrastructure with OpenShift Virtualization
The client is a multi-specialty hospital network operating across several regions, managing thousands of patient interactions daily. Their IT ecosystem included a mix of legacy EMR (Electronic Medical Records) systems, medical imaging software, and containerized microservices for telehealth, appointment scheduling, and data analytics.
As the organization expanded, maintaining separate environments for VMs and containers became increasingly complex. They sought a modernization approach that could consolidate both legacy and cloud-native workloads under a unified platform, without disrupting mission-critical healthcare operations or compromising regulatory compliance.
Due to separate environments, the client faced growing challenges in resource utilization, compliance management, and system interoperability.
- Fragmented Infrastructure Management: The client operated VMware-based legacy systems alongside containerized workloads, resulting in fragmented lifecycle management and duplicated monitoring setups.
- Resource Inefficiency: Legacy VMs consumed static compute and storage resources, while container workloads dynamically scaled. This imbalance reduced cluster utilization and increased operational overhead
- Compliance and Security Risks: Healthcare workloads require strict adherence to HIPAA and GDPR regulations. Managing two isolated infrastructures complicated patching, auditing, and access control.
- Inconsistent CI/CD Pipelines: VM-based applications couldn’t integrate seamlessly into the container CI/CD pipelines, delaying updates and deployment automation.
- Migration Complexity: Re-platforming critical VMs without service downtime posed challenges due to dependencies on legacy operating systems and custom integrations.
With our OpenShift consulting services, our experts architected an end-to-end modernization plan centered on OpenShift Virtualization (powered by KubeVirt), enabling hybrid workloads with unified management and automation.
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Hybrid Infrastructure Modernization
- Integrated OpenShift Virtualization to host KVM-based VMs directly within Kubernetes pods.
- Used Containerized Data Importer (CDI) to securely import existing VM images into OpenShift.
- Implemented node taints and tolerations to dedicate compute nodes for performance-critical healthcare applications.
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Unified Operations and Governance
- Deployed Operators for automated VM lifecycle management, image updates, and integrated ODF/OADP-based backup workflows.
- Standardized RBAC policies, network segmentation, and Security Context Constraints (SCCs) across both VM and container workloads.
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Performance and Resource Optimization
- Used HPA for horizontal scaling and VPA in recommendation mode to right-size resources.
- Allocated guaranteed CPU/memory resources for VMs using resource requests/limits to ensure predictable latency.
- Implemented persistent storage with dynamic provisioning using OpenShift Data Foundation (ODF).
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Monitoring and Observability
- Integrated Prometheus, Grafana, and KubeVirt metrics for unified visibility into VM and container performance.
- Configured custom alerts for CPU throttling, disk I/O latency, and pod restarts, enabling proactive issue detection.
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Seamless VM Migration and Integration
- Performed KubeVirt live migration for in-cluster VM movement and used CDI-based import workflows to onboard legacy VMs with minimal downtime.
- Gradually transitioned workloads into CI/CD pipelines for automated deployment and compliance checks.
- 50% Reduction in Infrastructure Costs: Eliminated separate virtualization and container management layers, lowering the total cost of ownership.
- 30% Increase in Resource Utilization: Intelligent scheduling and autoscaling improved overall infrastructure efficiency.
- Unified Operations: Provided unified operational visibility through OpenShift Console and integrated monitoring dashboards.
- Improved Compliance: With standardized access policies and automated auditing, compliance became easier to maintain across all workloads.
- Near-Zero Downtime Migration: Legacy healthcare applications successfully transitioned into OpenShift without user disruption.
With our deep expertise in OpenShift Virtualization and hybrid infrastructure consulting, the client transformed their legacy healthcare IT into a modern, Kubernetes-native environment. By running VMs and containers together under one control plane, they achieved greater scalability, stronger compliance, and significant operational efficiency. This hybrid infrastructure lays a strong foundation for future AI-driven and data-intensive healthcare initiatives.
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