Data migration is almost universally dreaded by IT professionals undertaking complex, application-level consolidation or renewal projects. A recent survey Celona conducted amongst telecoms IT professionals showed that 93% of them were fearful of application-level migration. This might seem a surprisingly high number, but unfortunately there are sound reasons for this level of unease. According to Bloor Research , over 80% of data migration projects are not delivered on time or to budget. Bloor's Phil Howard explains that research has revealed that Forbes 2,000 companies already spend at least $5 billion per year on migrations, and yet cost overruns average 30% and time overruns average 41%.

You might ask how this is possible? The answer is largely due to the fact that data migration is still not regarded as a valued skill and practice in its own right, but is treated as the final hurdle in a complex project - an afterthought once the functionality has been developed. At a recent British Computer Society (BCS) meeting BT's CIO Phil Dance bemoaned this fact.