Jira Migration Consolidates Teams and Reduces Risk for Major UK Insurer

THE CHALLENGE

Creating clarity and control at scale

Tooling fragmentation was slowing delivery and increasing risk.

As the insurer scaled its transformation programme, spanning dozens of initiatives, thousands of employees and over 120 third-party contributors, it became clear that collaboration was being blocked by inconsistent tooling.

Most teams had aligned on the organisation’s strategic internal Jira and Confluence instances. But one major third-party supplier was still using separate Jira and Confluence cloud instances, creating key challenges including:

– Compliance and security risks, with cloud instances managed externally and outside governance scope

– Limited visibility and planning, making it difficult to coordinate work or manage cross-team dependencies

– Inconsistent story hierarchies, with key terminology (e.g. Epics renamed as Features) creating confusion

– Inflexibility in Jira configuration, as internal changes couldn’t easily be applied across systems

– Licensing inefficiencies, with the cloud setup incurring additional fees and duplicated overhead

To accelerate delivery, maintain control and reduce risk, the client needed to bring all teams onto a single, secure Jira and Confluence instance.

THE SOLUTION

Automated, secure and built for collaboration

A secure, automated migration, with collaboration and compliance at the core.

Catapult worked with stakeholders across security, transformation and delivery to define a solution that met business, compliance and technical requirements.

Key solution components included:

– Jira and Confluence migration

All projects, issues and configuration were migrated from Jira Cloud into the internal Jira Server, including workflows, issue types and custom fields.

– Preserved hierarchy and issue linking

Cloud hierarchies were mapped using Portfolio for Jira’s parent-link field to preserve structure without compromising internal standards.

– Confluence migration with integrity

Linked Jira issues remained intact, ensuring no breakage across platforms.

– Federated administration model

Select third-party admins were granted scoped access to make configuration changes securely and independently.

– Secure access via VPN

A dedicated VPN tunnel was established to enable the third-party to access internal Jira/ Confluence securely, without exposing wider systems.

– Automated migration scripts

Catapult developed and used automation to ensure accuracy, speed up the process, and minimise manual rework.

THE RESULTS

Faster delivery. Stronger control. Lower Cost

Improved collaboration, reduced risk and measurable cost savings. With the migration complete, the insurer gained a unified Jira and Confluence environment that enabled faster delivery and stronger governance.

Catapult delivered a fast, low-risk migration that helped the client take back control of its DevOps tooling, enabling teams to move faster, stay secure and work as one.

Key outcomes:

– Improved team velocity, due to centralised planning and shared visibility

– Reduced configuration errors and fewer user complaints

– Streamlined third-party collaboration, with a repeatable model for secure access

– Lower governance overhead, with fewer tools to manage and audit

– Thousands saved in licence costs, by retiring cloud subscriptions