[Isn't moving to the cloud a good idea?] Mynet x Beyond engineer conversation

My name is Fujisawa and I am in charge of public relations and recruitment.

This time we have a talk between our customer and our engineers !

Our infrastructure engineers spoke with Mynet Inc. , who has been assisting us with cloud/server operation, maintenance, and relocation since 2018

the "game service business," which involves purchasing games from manufacturers and running them over the long term using its own know-how is responsible for the operation and maintenance of game servers and cloud migration

We dug deep into the details of the project and how the two companies communicated, asking questions such as, "Why did Mynet choose Beyond?" and "Honestly, what is Beyond's operation like?"

We usually communicate with Mynet via chat, so this was the first time some of the engineers met face-to-face online, and we'll be sharing the friendly conversation that took place throughout

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Mynet Co., Ltd.

・Noritake Aizawa, Engineering Group, Technology Management Department

He is in charge of solving MyNet's engineering problems, and is also involved in the migration to the cloud. He is the biggest drinker of the three

- Takuya Igari, Engineering Group, Technology Management Department

After working in the engineering group, he built the company's common infrastructure and experienced two server relocations. He is the most aggressive of the three

- Hiroki Horikoshi, Engineering Group Manager, Technology Management Department

His main job is progress management, but he also frequently gets involved in the construction site. He is a former infrastructure engineer and the oldest of the three

Beyond Co., Ltd.

Junichiro Okazaki, Section Chief, System Solutions Department

I have been involved in Mynet's relocation from the beginning, and have had the opportunity to make suggestions and learn a lot

Yuta Kanbara, System Solutions Department Manager

I have been involved in Mynet's relocation project since March 2020. I have met Horikoshi-san online twice, but this was my first time meeting Aizawa-san and Igari-san

・Shinji Nakauchi, Director of Technical Sales Department, Sales representative for Mynet.

・Umi Fujisawa, Public Relations and Recruitment Officer, interviewer for this episode.

What is cloud relocation?

Beyond Fujisawa: Today we'll be asking about cloud/server relocation and operation, so please take a look. First of all, could you tell us what process Mynet follows when it comes to cloud relocation projects?

Mynet's Aizawa: To explain the process of the relocation itself, we basically acquire the games created by the publisher by purchasing them, and then move the cloud after the operation is transferred. Since we don't know anything about the cloud configuration, we don't know whether we can operate it or not, so before acquiring it, we first interview the publisher about the technology it runs on. We can't tell you the detailed configuration before signing the contract, so we estimate the server configuration and other details to a certain extent using the limited information, and then consider the feasibility and cost of the cloud relocation.

After that, we will purchase the system and you will receive your cloud account for the first time. We will check whether the expected server configuration is correct, and if there are any discrepancies, we will adjust the feasibility study and ultimately make a forecast that you can migrate with this configuration

It's around this time that we consult with Beyond, asking questions like, "Can we move?" After about a month or two has passed and the project has settled down to a certain extent, we present our engineering group's recommendation, saying, "With this cloud, it will cost about this much and you can do this," and then the project team makes a decision. Once they have made the decision, we are ready to place an order, so we tell the cloud vendor, "We'll go with this cloud," and inform Beyond, "We'll move to this cloud and start at this time."

From there, Beyond will investigate the server configuration and will carry out the relocation and switchover based on the schedule in approximately two months

The deciding factor for introducing Beyond

Beyond Fujisawa: What prompted you to first approach our company for a project?

Mynet's Aizawa: We first asked Beyond to handle our relocation project about three years ago (2018). The reason we asked them to do the work was because a cloud vendor we were working with at the time introduced us to Mr. Nakauchi, a sales representative at Beyond, and that was the first time we met.

In 2017, the secondary business of social games was not well known, so it was very difficult to explain our business model. At the time, we were talking to various sales people about MSPs and cloud relocation options, but we couldn't effectively explain our business model, which was "we're not the manufacturer, but we take over the titles that the manufacturer created and operates, and our goal is to make a profit over the long term," so we had a hard time getting proposals that suited our needs.

However, about a week after we spoke with Nakauchi, Beyond sent us a proposal that matched exactly what we were looking for. At the time, Horikoshi and I were excited about it (laughs)

Beyond came to us with a proposal after understanding where we found value, which led to our decision to adopt the service

Mynet's Horikoshi: I was just looking through the chat logs, and I found that the first project started two years and eight months ago, in November 2018. At the time, I was talking about the future, saying, "Please create chat groups as the number of titles increases," and Nakauchi said, "I'll do my best so that we can create groups!" So, I counted and there were 19 groups, including the one that has just been closed.

Beyond Nakauchi: That's an incredible number.

Mynet Horikoshi: That's half of our titles.

Mynet Aizawa: Yes, considering the pace, we ask for it once every two or three months.

Beyond Nakauchi: Thank you very much.

Effects of introducing Beyond

Beyond Fujisawa: Have you noticed any changes since you started entrusting projects to our company?

Mynet's Aizawa: Before we started asking Beyond for full-scale operations, we didn't have that many projects where we were asking MSPs to handle operations. One thing that I think is definitely different since we started entrusting it to Beyond is that the emergency work and psychological burden has been significantly reduced.

When dealing with problems outside of business hours, engineers tend to work alone, but when they do, even a simple problem can take up a lot of time if they make a mistake in their initial investigation. Since we can ask Beyond to handle some of the initial investigations, I feel like it's become easier for engineers to focus on the project

Mynet's Igari: Speaking personally, I think my infrastructure skills have improved since working with Beyond. Before, I had only built one simple in-house platform, and only knew the major things like AWS EC2, S3, and CloudFront, but I learned a lot about infrastructure while working with Beyond on the relocation.

The thing that left the biggest impression on me was the migration between clouds. Mr. Okazaki had previously taught me how to migrate database dump files and files stored on the server, which allowed me to create a test environment for the subsequent migration. He has been extremely helpful in that regard, and I use his advice as a reference. I'd also like to thank him for teaching me how to set up swap

Beyond Okazaki: No, no, we appreciate it.

Mynet Igari: I also on morale is quite large. In the previous relocation project, there were still some issues remaining on the project side, and we were unsure whether to relocate as is or go back to the previous server and make adjustments. Personally, I wrote in the chat that I wanted to do the relocation with all my might if I could stick with it, and Okazaki responded by saying, "I'm not going to lose in terms of enthusiasm, so if there's anything I can do, please let me." I think that sort of thing really boosts morale, and I think that kind of influence is also big.

Mynet Aizawa: That's a great story.

Mynet's Horikoshi: Speaking internally, other people had the same reaction as Igari. Originally, I had never worked with infrastructure, and the impression that "infrastructure is a scary thing" was strong among server engineers. This was true even for people who write code, so people in other industries also think "servers are scary," but by working with Beyond, the barriers have gradually been lowered, as people have learned things like "So this is how you solve problems" and "So this is how you build it," and I feel that the hurdle to working with infrastructure within the company has been significantly lowered.

Beyond Okazaki: Recently, as we've been working on various things, I've been wondering if it's really okay for Mynet to do so much for us. We provide our knowledge of infrastructure, but I also feel bad for them for doing so.

Mynet Horikoshi: Well, there are more people who give Oka-chan (Okazaki) or Kanbara-san a TO in chat now than there were a while ago, right? I think that's an interesting effect. I think they're feeling their way around, wondering, "How much should I rely on them?" or "Will Nakauchi-san get angry if I tell him?"

Beyond Okazaki: It's totally fine for you to listen to me!

Beyond Fujisawa: Has the way the two companies communicate changed since the early days?

Mynet Aizawa: There hasn't been much change, in a good way. Maybe the amount of grass* growing has increased when I'm in a light mood.

* Grass = w

Mynet Horikoshi: I'm glad that Oka-chan has started to make the grass grow.

Beyond Okazaki: If it was grass, I'd let it grow lol

Beyond Nakauchi: Mynet might be the only one who chats with customers who are so excited about it.

Mynet's Horikoshi : Of course, relationships change over time, and I think it's a great thing to understand the distance between you. It's annoying to have to start every conversation with "Thank you for your help."

Mynet's Aizawa: It also leads to smoother communication. If we can break down the "Please wait a moment while we check" rule a little,

How is Beyond actually handling the relocation and operation?

Beyond Fujisawa: Are there any points that make you feel like it's easy to work with Beyond?

Mynet's Aizawa: Beyond generally doesn't frown upon requests. They don't make any sacred cows in their work, and they generally step in even if what we ask them to do is inefficient. They'll say things like, "We investigated and found this, so let's do it this way," but they're also prepared to do things they're not particularly good at, and they'll ask, "How do you do it?" and put things together, so we feel like we can work together as a team, which makes it easy to do business with them.

Mynet's Horikoshi: one of the most important aspects of being an engineer to say "I don't know what I don't know ." If you say, "I don't know, but it's okay," you're bound to have an accident. But if both parties know what they don't know, then they can lay out a path to understand each other, saying, "Let's do this, let's do that." So I'm very grateful when people say they don't know. That's what happened to you, Kanbara-kun, hasn't it?

Beyond Kanbara: Yes, to be honest, I had no idea what to do.

Mynet's Horikoshi: Well, of course. Even after decades of working here, there are still things I don't know, and no one knows everything. But even if you don't understand something or have never done it before, if you try it, it will become something you understand and have done, so I think that's what we should focus on.

Beyond Okazaki: There are a lot of things I don't understand in my daily life. Even though I don't understand, I try to start by researching the parts I do understand. Horikoshi-san and Igari-san teach me things I don't know, which helps me achieve the results.

Mynet Horikoshi: Even if we say we don't understand each other, it doesn't necessarily mean we don't understand the same thing, and it's great that we can teach each other what we understand.

Mynet's Aizawa: Relocation is definitely a good idea. That's a bit of a vague way of putting it, though.

As with any relocation project, there comes a time when you have to step into the black box that has been created through operation. By actually relocating and encountering problems, we were able to gradually understand the system through various exchanges, and Beyond has been extremely helpful to us. Thank you very much

Beyond Okazaki: Thank you very much.

Mynet's Horikoshi: I check for alert notifications about outages even on my days off, but just looking at them is so much easier. In the past, I would have had to start up my PC, go into the server, check the situation, respond, and then recover after a while, which would take up about an hour of my time. Now, when an alert goes off, I check to see that Beyond has started responding, and thinking that it's probably OK, I check again 15 minutes later and there's a report that the system has been restored, saying "response completed." It's such a wonderful feeling. It's the best.

Beyond Fujisawa: Do you have any requests for Beyond's Okazaki or Kanbara, such as "I wish they would do more of this!?"

Mynet Aizawa: They're already doing a lot of things, so maybe I'd like them to grow more grass.

Beyond Okazaki: You can definitely grow grass though lol

Mynet Igari: I don't have any negative points either. When we were relocating, we had Beyond investigate the directories to be migrated to the server, but at the time, there was a server that was shut down during the nighttime, and the investigation showed that this server was "not eligible as a migration destination." I thought that meant that Okazaki must have investigated it during the hours when people were sleeping. I was always worried about whether that was okay.

Beyond Okazaki: There were a lot of operations to do during the day, so when I happened to be checking at night, I thought, "Huh, this isn't working." I'm the type of person who likes to get everything done when I'm in the mood.

Mynet Horikoshi: I think Okazaki-san should be more scathing about our methods. Even when we ask for something in an inefficient way and I think I should step in and stop him, Okazaki-san always responds by saying, "We'll do it that way." You know, it's okay to say, "There's a better way, so let's do it this way." I don't think they know either. So I don't think you should be shy about that. Actually, Kanbara-san is stronger in that area. Kanbara-san often speaks up. "What do you think about this?" I really like that.

Beyond Nakauchi: Kids these days.

Mynet's Aizawa: Kanbara-san always includes all the necessary documentation, so even those who are seeing it for the first time can understand and say, "That's amazing!" You can understand why he's making that kind of proposal. I think it's great when I watch the chat.

Mynet's Horikoshi : Since it's a business, there are clients and contractors, but I think of our relationship with Beyond as a partnership. Take your days off and rest.

Beyond Kanbara: I've been involved in projects with Mynet for a long time, so I have a lot of emotional attachment to them. Even on my days off, I find myself constantly wondering, "Is an alert going off?"

Regarding future relationships

Beyond Fujisawa: What kind of relationship would you like to build between Mynet and Beyond in the future?

Mynet's Horikoshi : I would like to gradually eliminate relationships that are dependent on people. The current situation is good, but it is also dependent on individuals. If one person is gone, something is missing. I would like to gradually eliminate the dependency on individuals so that things do not get stuck even if someone is missing.

Beyond Nakauchi: It will be after the coronavirus pandemic is over, but we would also like to see engineers interact with each other.

Mynet's Horikoshi: There must have been times when we realized that Okazaki was responding to a question on the chat, but in fact it was someone else. It would be interesting to be able to see that.

Beyond Fujisawa: By the way, what do you think is the best thing about Mynet from Beyond's perspective?

Beyond Kanbara: There are so many...

Beyond Okazaki: It's really easy to do.

Beyond Kanbara: When we receive a request, Mynet often works with us to think about it and get the job done. I think, "What great people!"

Beyond Okazaki: They take our suggestions into consideration and help us with the infrastructure, so we're really grateful. It helps us learn a lot, too.

Mynet's Aizawa: When we're dealing with issues or solving problems, I think working together allows both of us to perform at our best. I really like this situation, and I think it's an extremely productive activity . I think there will be many more situations like this in the future as we move and operate, so if we can solve them together it will be a boon for me, and if I can give something to Beyond, I'll be very happy, so I want to continue.

Mynet's Igari: Whenever a problem occurs, Beyond really works with us to investigate it, so I hope we can continue to do so and improve each other's technical capabilities. I also hope that Mynet can properly share information with Beyond and build a relationship where we can keep track of the situation regarding relocation and operation.

Mynet Horikoshi: They're both really mature. I'm more of a worldly person, and I don't want to lose. To Oka-chan or Kanbara-san. When we run into a problem, they come up with amazing ideas. I want to solve it first. You might think, "Horikoshi-san, you know all this stuff, how amazing," but in reality, I'm actually researching it behind the scenes, so it's crazy. I think engineers have that feeling of not wanting to lose.

Mynet Igari: Yes, there is. I think so. Yes.

Beyond Okazaki: Yes, there is. I would like to have a relationship where we can help each other grow.

Beyond Nakauchi: I'm really grateful that they treat me like a partner to this extent. The engineers working with Mynet are constantly improving their technical skills, and I can see that even as a salesperson. I hope this relationship continues in the future.

Finally, a word from Beyond

Beyond Okazaki: I am so grateful to Mynet every day. We are doing everything we can, so please feel free to contact us at any time if you need anything. Thank you for your continued support.

Beyond Kanbara: Compared to Okazaki, I'm still inexperienced as an infrastructure engineer, and I think I'm causing a lot of trouble to Mynet. But I'm having fun working on every project, and I think I'm growing by working on a service together. I look forward to working with you in the future.

A word from Mynet

Mynet's Aizawa: I really like the atmosphere where we can all think positively even when things get difficult, so I would be very grateful if you could continue to do business with us. Thank you as always.

Mynet Igari: I believe there will be situations in the future where we will need to cooperate with each other, so we apologize for any inconvenience this may cause, but we appreciate your continued support.

Mynet's Horikoshi: Let's go out for drinks once the coronavirus pandemic is over.

A mutually beneficial relationship

Through the cloud migration, my knowledge of the infrastructure between the two companies has increased and I have grown as an engineer, so I feel that Mynet and Beyond have built the best relationship as business partners

We hope to continue supporting the operation of the game through relocations and operations, while also working together to improve our technical capabilities. Thank you to Mr. Horikoshi, Mr. Aizawa, and Mr. Igari from Mynet for speaking with us today!

By the way, an article in 2020 in which Mynet Horikoshi and our company's Okazaki and Nakauchi were interviewed about cloud relocation was published in "AUTOMATON,"

Mynet will take over the management of mobile games and make them ``long-lived.'' How are they transferring services? Revealing the inside story with infrastructure company Beyond