Modernizing Municipal Operations: How the City of Lethbridge Migrated JD Edwards to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure with ERP-One

‍Overview: Future-Proofing ERP with Oracle Cloud

The City of Lethbridge has relied on JD Edwards (JDE) as its enterprise resource planning (ERP) system since 2007, supporting essential functions such as accounting, procurement, asset management, work order management, CRM, and financial reporting.  

By 2023, their existing version of JDE was approaching end-of-support. Rather than simply upgrading, the City of Lethbridge saw a strategic opportunity to modernize its ERP system by migrating to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI). Their primary goals included long-term cost savings, platform flexibility, and a reduced maintenance footprint.  

ERP-One was selected as the implementation partner, offering expert guidance for the upgrade, migration, and re-platforming to Oracle’s cloud environment.  

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Client Background & Challenges

As a municipal government, the City of Lethbridge needed a secure, cost-effective, and reliable ERP solution that could evolve with their operations. However, they faced several key challenges:

• Lack of cloud experience: The City of Lethbridge’s internal teams across networking, database management, and CNC, had little to no exposure to cloud platforms.  

• Need for self-sufficient infrastructure: The cloud solution had to align with existing support skill levels, allowing the City of Lethbridge team to operate and maintain the system independently post-migration.

• Budget constraints: Affordability and long-term value were critical, and the cloud solution needed to maximize cost efficiency without compromising functionality.  

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The Solution: Cloud Migration Tailored for Self-Sufficiency

ERP-One's engagement focused not just on technical delivery, but on education and enablement. Understanding the City of Lethbridge’s limited familiarity with cloud environments, ERP-One led a collaborative process that included:  

• A tailored migration and upgrade strategy aligned with Oracle best practices.

• Building an OCI environment configured for the City of Lethbridge’s specific needs and capacity.

• Ongoing knowledge-sharing to ensure every stakeholder understood the system’s design and management.

ERP-One's consultative approach demystified the cloud journey for the City of Lethbridge and gave their team confidence and capability to own their infrastructure.  

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Results: Empowered, Efficient, and Cloud-Ready

The migration was a clear success:

• Smooth transition to OCI: The City of Lethbridge’s critical ERP operations continued uninterrupted during and after the migration.

• Reduced infrastructure costs: The cloud architecture was optimized for cost, aligning with the city’s budget requirements.  

• Self-sufficient teams: The City of Lethbridge’s IT staff now confidently maintain and manage the OCI environment thanks to ERP-One's extensive coaching and documentation.  

• Strong advisory partnership: While the City of Lethbridge manages day-to-day operations, ERP-One remains a trusted advisor, ready to support as needed with CNC and application-side expertise.  

The City of Lethbridge now benefits from a scalable, modern ERP system tailored to their long-term operational needs. The partnership with ERP-One continues to evolve, with ongoing collaboration opportunities and advisory positioning for continued success in the cloud.  

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