The data management landscape is undergoing profound transformations: in a context where innovation accelerates relentlessly, organizations are tasked with managing increasingly complex architectures.
Today, the challenge is no longer simply managing large volumes of data and metadata, but doing so while optimizing the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) through infrastructure modernization that truly supports business needs. It is this rationalization that bridges the gap towards innovation: only in this way can we ensure that data is ‘AI-ready’ enabling businesses to make the leap to fully data-driven decisions.
In this strategy, security remains a non-negotiable pillar, while time-to-solution becomes the true currency of success. Ultimately, operational efficiency is the definitive competitive advantage for those looking to drive change, rather than merely adapt to it.
Irion has chosen to respond to these challenges not with superficial adjustments but by rethinking Irion EDM® from the ground up. The result is a transformation journey that has made the product Cloud Native, containerized, observable, and infrastructure-agnostic.
this article, we dive into the technical and strategic pillars of this evolution, analyzing how concrete choices. ranging from containers and Kubernetes to Linux translate into operational value.
Redefining the concept of Cloud Native
The starting point of this evolution is a cultural and technological redefinition of the term “Cloud Native.” Often, in the market, this concept is confused with the simple “lift and shift” migration of on-premise applications to public cloud providers. For Irion, the vision is different and more ambitious.
Being Cloud Native means adopting an architectural paradigm based on microservices, containerization, and open standards that primarily facilitate integration and deployment processes. The goal is to build a product that is intrinsically modular and portable, without tying the customer to a specific cloud provider. This approach ensures that Irion EDM® can operate seamlessly in any deployment scenario with the same consistency and efficiency:
- On-Premises: For those who need to keep their data within their own data centers.
- Cloud: For those leveraging the scalability of public cloud providers.
- Hybrid: For those operating in mixed environments. For example, one could imagine an architecture where execution engines for checks are distributed on-premises to minimize “distance” from the data, while the hub is in the cloud. Alternatively, one might keep the development and/or testing environment on-premises for cost optimization, while production is in the cloud to benefit from native scale-out logic.
The strategy can be summarized in a formula: Cloud Native yes but not Cloud only.
Containerization: standardizing the software lifecycle
Although Irion EDM® has long been based on a microservices architecture, the widespread adoption of containers represents a significant leap forward in managing the software lifecycle and releasing solutions.ni.
Technically, a container acts as a self-contained “micro virtual machine” that includes not just the application, but all the dependencies, libraries, and configurations necessary for its operation. This approach solves the root cause of compatibility issues between development, testing, and production environments.
The operational benefits, as described in Irion’s technical documentation, are most evident in Change Management:
- Immutable Deployment: Product updates no longer happen through patches or incremental changes to existing machines. Instead, a new container image is simply published. The system shuts down the previous instance and starts the new one, already configured and ready for use.
- CI/CD and REST APIs: To further simplify operations, out-of-the-box tools are provided for integration into Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment processes. Additionally, the use of REST APIs allows for uniform and programmatic management of application solution updates, making maintenance operations predictable and automatable.
No Lock-in Strategy
Every technical decision described in this evolutionary journey converges toward a precise business goal: TCO optimization and technological freedom.
Open Standards and Portability
The decision to use OCI (Open Container Initiative) standard containers and Kubernetes orchestration aims to avoid any form of vendor lock-in. The product is designed to ensure maximum portability: the customer is free to change underlying infrastructure (from cloud to on-premise or vice versa) without altering the architecture of the solution or facing costly migrations. Additionally, the approach is entirely cloud-agnostic, free from any logic specific to a single hyperscaler, and therefore guarantees maximum portability between different providers. This eliminates the risk of vendor lock-in and allows for choosing the most cost- and performance-efficient environment.
Efficiency and Linux
Automatic scalability reduces operational costs: only the resources strictly necessary for the current load are used (and paid for in the case of the cloud). Secondly, the architecture has been optimized to eliminate ancillary licensing costs. There is no dependence on proprietary operating systems. The product relies on Linux, chosen for its robustness, stability, and security. Linux now represents the reference standard for the server, web, and cloud world, offering a highly configurable base that has evolved in perfect symbiosis with containerization technologies.
Ready for the future
What we’ve described is not just a technological evolution, but a structural transformation. Irion EDM® retains the functionalities and robustness that have always characterized it, but now it is projected onto a modern infrastructure, designed to face the challenges of tomorrow.
Flexibility, observability, automatic resilience, and cost efficiency are no longer just desirable goals but intrinsic characteristics of the new architecture. It’s the same product as always, but with a completely new engine.
A transformation designed and implemented entirely in Italy by Irion’s research and development team based in Turin. Behind every architectural choice described in this article is the work of over 200 professionals who, since 2004, have been building enterprise technology with their own expertise, not by composing third-party solutions, but by developing an original platform that is also internationally recognized by Gartner®. This same proximity is reflected in customer support: a direct contact person who knows the product in depth because they wrote it, and who accompanies each project with the continuity and responsibility of someone who does not outsource either the code or the relationship.
Welcome to the future of Irion EDM®.
FAQ
The modernization journey was designed to be non-disruptive. Existing functionalities and solutions remain intact: only the underlying infrastructure changes, not the application logic. The migration to Cloud Native architecture can take place gradually, without the need to redesign what has already been built.
The impact is measured across multiple fronts. The elimination of proprietary operating system licenses, automatic resource scalability (only pay for what you use in the case of the cloud), and reduced deployment and maintenance times result in a structural reduction in operational costs. Change management, in particular, becomes faster and more predictable thanks to containers and REST APIs.
No, ed è una scelta deliberata. Irion EDM® è costruito su standard aperti —(container OCI e orchestrazione Kubernetes) che funzionano in modo identico su AWS, Azure, Google Cloud o in ambienti on-premise. Non esistono dipendenze da servizi proprietari di un singolo hyperscaler: il cliente è libero di scegliere o cambiare infrastruttura in qualsiasi momento, senza costi di migrazione architetturale.
Most international data management platforms are built on legacy architectures, later adapted to the cloud, often with a strong reliance on the vendor’s own ecosystem. Irion EDM®, on the other hand, is natively designed on open standards, with an internal R&D team that develops and maintains the entire platform. This translates into greater architectural flexibility, the absence of lock-in, and direct support from those who deeply understand the product.
Grazie all’adozione di OpenTelemetry, uno standard aperto supportato dai principali ecosistemi cloud e DevOps, i dati di telemetria di Irion EDM® (log, metriche, trace) possono essere esportati verso qualsiasi piattaforma di osservabilità già in uso in azienda, come Datadog, Grafana, Azure Monitor e simili. Non è richiesto alcun tool proprietario aggiuntivo.
Irion EDM® natively supports three scenarios: full on-premise, full cloud, and hybrid. There is no absolute “recommended” deployment: the optimal choice depends on regulatory context, data localization, and cost objectives. For example, one might keep execution engines on-premise to minimize data latency while managing the application hub in the cloud to benefit from scalability. The Irion team supports the evaluation of the architecture most suited to each scenario.
Moving an application to AWS or Azure doesn’t automatically make it Cloud Native. The fundamental difference is design: a Cloud Native application is built for distributed environments, based on microservices, containerized, and orchestrated with tools like Kubernetes. An application simply “moved to the cloud” (the so-called lift and shift) retains its rigid structure and does not leverage the real benefits of the cloud: automatic scalability, resilience, and updates without service interruption. Irion EDM belongs to the first category: it has been redesigned from the ground up, not adapted.
Kubernetes è il sistema di orchestrazione più diffuso al mondo per la gestione dei container. In parole semplici: decide quante “istanze” di un servizio avviare in base al carico, le distribuisce sui server disponibili, le riavvia automaticamente in caso di errore e le aggiorna senza interrompere il funzionamento. Per una piattaforma di Enterprise Data Management, questo si traduce in continuità operativa, gestione efficiente delle risorse e capacità di scalare automaticamente nei momenti di picco, senza intervento manuale.
Vendor lock-in occurs when a company becomes so dependent on a technology provider that it cannot change without facing costs, complex migrations, or functionality loss. In the cloud, this often happens when applications use proprietary services of a single hyperscaler (e.g., a database or messaging system exclusive to AWS or Azure). The solution is to adopt open and portable standards. Irion EDM® uses OCI containers and Kubernetes, technologies that work identically on any infrastructure: changing cloud providers doesn’t require touching the solution’s architecture.
Data is “AI-ready” when it is accessible, well-governed, certified for quality, and available in the formats and timeframes required by AI models. Achieving this standard is not just a matter of data quality: it requires infrastructure that guarantees scalability to handle large volumes, observability to monitor data health in real-time, and flexibility to integrate new AI tools without re-architecting everything. This is why infrastructure modernization is not an end in itself but the prerequisite for any effective AI strategy.
There is no universal answer, but the main cost factors to compare are: operating system software licenses, hardware and its maintenance, IT staff dedicated to infrastructure management, and in the case of the cloud, the cost of pay-per-use services. A modern architecture such as Irion EDM® reduces the “licensing” item by eliminating dependence on proprietary operating systems (the product runs on Linux) and cuts operating costs thanks to automatic scalability: only the resources that are actually needed are used. The hybrid approach of on-premise for development and cloud for production is often the most efficient solution for optimizing overall TCO.
