Modernise Your Legacy Business Software — Before It Fails

Ocom migrates legacy business applications — Microsoft Access, Visual Basic 6, Delphi, FoxPro and Classic ASP — onto modern, supported platforms, without losing the decades of business logic buried inside them.

Is Digital Debt Holding Your Business Back?

Every year your business runs on legacy software, the risk and cost grow — just like financial debt. The technology your application was built on may no longer be maintained. The operating system it requires may be reaching end of life. The developers who understand it are harder to find and more expensive to hire.

This is Digital Debt — and it compounds silently until something breaks.

The Six Signs of Digital Debt

If any of these sound familiar, your legacy software is costing you more than you think.

Unsupported Platforms

The technology your app was built on is no longer maintained. No security patches, no bug fixes, no future.

OS Incompatibility

Can't run on modern Windows or server versions. Stuck on old hardware that could fail any day.

Developer Scarcity

Finding developers who know old technologies is increasingly difficult and expensive. The talent pool shrinks every year.

Security & Compliance Risks

Legacy apps lack encryption, MFA, and audit trails. Meeting Essential Eight or industry compliance is virtually impossible.

Integration Limitations

Can't connect to modern APIs, cloud services, or mobile apps. Your business data is siloed and inaccessible.

Rising Maintenance Costs

Fewer specialists means higher rates. Old hardware and OS licences become expensive or unavailable. The "cheap" old system costs more every year.

What You Get on the Other Side

Modernising is not just about removing risk. This is what your business looks like once the work is done.

A Platform With a Future

Built on technology that is still supported in ten years, still receiving security patches, and still attracting developers.

Works Anywhere

Runs on any modern device — from the office, from home, from a phone on site. Your team stops being chained to one desk in one building.

No Longer One Person's Secret

Documented, modern code that any competent developer can pick up. Your business stops depending on one person who knows how it works.

Compliance You Can Pass

MFA, encryption and proper audit trails built in — so Essential Eight and industry compliance become achievable instead of impossible.

Connects to What You Use

Talks to Xero, MYOB and QuickBooks, and to modern APIs generally. Your data stops being trapped inside one application.

Costs That Fall

Standard technology, available developers, supported infrastructure. Maintenance cost trends down over time instead of climbing every year.

And if you are thinking about succession or sale: your software stops being a liability on the balance sheet, and starts being an asset a buyer will pay for.

How We Modernise Legacy Applications

We don't start from scratch. We start from what works.

Your App Is the Prototype

We study your current application to understand exactly what it does, how your team uses it, and what works well. No requirements are lost.

Your Data Comes With You

We migrate your existing data into the new system. No starting from scratch. Your history, your records, your reports — all preserved.

Modern Platform, Familiar Workflow

The new system feels familiar to your team but runs on supported, secure, modern technology with a future.

A Typical Project

Drawn from the legacy migrations we have completed. Not one client — the pattern they have in common.

The business

A trade or services company, 10–30 staff

The old system

A Microsoft Access database that had grown into the backbone of the business

Data migrated

A few thousand records and five to ten years of trading history

Time to live

Three to six months from kickoff to going live

Cutover

One to two weeks running old and new side by side, with some duplicate entry, then a clean switch.

The result

Staff access the system from anywhere — office, site, or phone. Multiple people work in it at once. Reporting runs itself, dashboards update in real time, and invoices flow straight into the accounting package.

What It Costs and How Long

The two questions everybody asks and nobody answers. We will not publish a price for work we have not scoped, but here is exactly how you find out what yours costs — and what happens to your business while the work runs.

1
A conversation

Free, and no obligation. We look at what you are running, what is hurting, and whether replacing it is even the right answer. Sometimes it is not, and we will say so.

2
A fixed-price specification

A written specification of what your current system does and what the replacement will do, for a price agreed up front. It is yours to keep, whoever ends up building it.

3
A fixed-scope quote

The specification produces a firm price and a firm timeline for the build. You know the number and the date before you commit to either.

4
We build alongside you

Your existing application is the prototype. We work from what it already does, and your data is migrated across as part of the build, not bolted on afterwards.

5
Parallel running

Near the end, both systems run side by side so you can check the new one against the old on real work. It means some duplicate entry for a short window — we keep that window as short as we can.

6
Cutover, when you say so

We switch when you are satisfied, not when the calendar says to.

Your old system stays live and stays the system of record until the day you decide to switch.

Legacy Technologies We Upgrade

Choose your technology to see the risks and how we approach the upgrade.

Microsoft Access
Critical Risk

Already excluded from Microsoft 365 and on extinction watch lists. Your Access application is living on borrowed time.

Learn More
Delphi
High Risk

Requires significant rework just to run on modern OS. If you're investing in changes anyway, invest in a platform with a future.

Learn More
Visual Basic 6
Critical Risk

Microsoft stopped supporting the VB6 development tools in 2008. The IDE doesn't run on modern Windows. The developers who know it are retiring.

Learn More
FoxPro
Critical Risk

Completely abandoned by Microsoft in 2015. No patches for over a decade. The most urgent legacy platform to leave.

Learn More
Classic ASP
High Risk

Frozen since the early 2000s. Baked-in security vulnerabilities. Every Windows Server update is a gamble.

Learn More

Frequently Asked Questions

No. Your data comes with you. Migrating your existing records — your history, your transactions, your reports — into the new system is part of the project, not an optional extra. Nothing is left stranded in the old application.

Less than you would expect. We study how your team actually uses the current system and keep the workflow familiar. The technology underneath changes completely; the way your people work does not.

It depends on your system, and we will not guess. The specification stage sets a fixed timeline for your application before you commit to a build, so you get a date rather than an estimate that drifts.

Yes. Your existing system stays live and stays the system of record while we build. Near the end we run both side by side so you can check the new one against the old on real work, and we only switch when you are satisfied. The parallel period does mean some duplicate entry for a short window — we keep it as short as we can.

It is not a blocker. We work from the running application and its database — the software itself tells us what it does. It does cost more, because discovery takes longer without source code to read, and we will tell you what that looks like before you commit to anything.

Start with a conversation about your system — no charge and no obligation. If it makes sense to go further, the next step is a fixed-price specification of what you have and what the replacement will do. That produces a fixed-scope quote for the build, so you know the number before you commit to it. The specification is yours to keep, whoever ends up building it.

Sooner than feels comfortable. The person leaving is carrying knowledge that was never written down, and once they have gone, reconstructing it costs more and takes longer. If they are still available — even a day a fortnight — that is the cheapest window you will ever have. Start the conversation now, even if the project itself is a year away.

Sometimes, and we will tell you if it is. Compatibility settings, a re-host, or running it on a virtual machine can genuinely buy you time, and if that is the sensible answer for your situation we will say so rather than sell you a rebuild. What it does not fix is the cause: if the development tools no longer run, you still cannot change your software. It buys time. It does not clear the debt.

Both are symptoms of the same thing. Access keeps everything in a single file with a hard 2GB ceiling, and it was never designed for the load you are now putting on it. Repairing and compacting buys time. Moving the data onto a proper database server removes the ceiling and the corruption risk for good.

No. If you would rather run the new system on your own server, that is supported. It is worth knowing what you take on: backups, uptime and hardware become your responsibility, remote and mobile access take more setting up, and you carry the upgrade cycle. Plenty of businesses have good reasons to stay on-premises — we will just make sure it is a decision rather than an accident.

Not Sure Where to Start?

Contact us for a no-obligation conversation about your legacy application. We'll help you understand your options and the best path forward.

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