How Porter cut cloud costs by over 30% migrating from AWS to Google Cloud

Porter, an intra-city logistics company in India, which has over 300,000 monthly driver-partners and 2 million customers, recently completed a large-scale cloud migration from Amazon Web Services (AWS) to Google Cloud Platform (GCP). In an interview with TechCircle, Ankit Srivastava, VP of Engineering at Porter, discussed the cloud migration process and how this move helped the Bengaluru-based company in cost-cutting, and improved productivity and customer experience, as it plans to enter its next growth phase.

Challenges faced before migration

Founded in 2014, Porter offers a suite of services that includes on-demand trucking, packers and movers, and enterprise logistics solutions. Speaking about the technology scenario in the logistics startup before the cloud migration, Srivastava said that Porter’s technology backbone has evolved over a decade to support the needs of a fast-growing logistics business. While the setup was robust, it had grown organically, bringing a lot of inherited inefficiencies. According to him, “As growth accelerated post-2021, the gap between business demand and infrastructure agility became more visible. Resource provisioning was centralised and manual, slowing development velocity. Infrastructure-as-Code (IaC) was in place for newer international operations, but India still operated on a more traditional setup. Limited containerization added complexity to deployments.”

With operations expanding 60–70% year-on-year, modernisation became essential, not just to keep pace, but to unlock the scalability, flexibility, and speed needed for Porter’s next phase of growth, added Srivastava.

The cloud migration process

The cloud modernisation began in September 2023 with the signing of the Google Cloud Platform contract, following months of architectural planning, scalability discussions, cost optimisation, and team preparation.

Explaining the cloud migration process in detail, Srivastava said, “A key decision was to ensure internal ownership. Before working with GCP and vendor teams, our engineers underwent company-wide Kubernetes training in December 2023, equipping them to lead the migration and reduce future vendor dependency.”

The migration followed a phased approach. “We started with Packers & Movers in July 2024, moved to international operations in August, and concluded with India in September, the largest and most complex cutover. Sequencing migrations in this order allowed the team to refine processes and minimise risk by the time we reached India’s transition.”

Cutovers were scheduled during low-volume hours, between 11 pm and 7 am, to reduce disruption. Customers and driver-partners were informed in advance, enabling them to plan around the change.

The main challenge, according to Srivastava, was scale, requiring more engineering effort than initially estimated. However, simulations, iterative learning, and cross-functional coordination ensured a smooth transition.

Improved cost and productivity

Speaking about the benefits of moving to Google Cloud, he informed, the migration delivered measurable improvements across cost, productivity, and experience. From a financial perspective, GCP’s commercial model, usage-based credits and optimised SKUs, have reduced cloud costs by more than 30%, without compromising capability.

On the productivity side, the adoption of IaC and containerisation also made a difference. Resource provisioning, which earlier took days, can now be completed in under 10 minutes. Teams can move independently, release faster, and build with confidence, strengthening the overall developer experience.

From a customer perspective, downtime was limited to nine off-peak hours for India operations. The migration was followed by a rigorous 25 days of uninterrupted service through peak season, demonstrating the stability and reliability of the new infrastructure, benefiting both customers and driver-partners.

“With the migration complete, we are now focusing on strengthening security and simplifying our platform for long-term agility. This year, the company focused on a comprehensive security program to make Porter one of India’s most secure logistics platforms, addressing everything from advanced data protection to access management,” he said.

At the same time, we are streamlining architecture by shifting from manual code updates to a version-controlled, platform-specific approach. This will enable faster, safer updates and support rapid market expansion, without the need for major re-engineering in the future.

Lessons learnt and way ahead

Srivastava believes several factors proved beneficial for the company in its entire cloud migration journey. “Firstly, by investing in upskilling our teams early, we ensured long-term capability and reduced dependence on external vendors. Second, we followed a phased approach. Starting with less complex systems allowed us to refine strategies and contain downtime when transitioning critical operations like India.

The company also prioritised reliability over speed. Fully adopting Infrastructure-as-Code and containerization required more upfront investment of time and effort, but delivered greater stability, rollback control, and consistency across environments.

Srivastava also stated that proactive communication matters. “We aligned customers, driver-partners, and stakeholders in advance, mitigating disruption and preserving trust. Treating the migration like a product launch, with defined roles, rehearsals, and clear playbooks, made the process predictable and repeatable,” he added

For Porter, this migration represents a cultural shift, creating a platform that supports the agility, scalability, and resilience required for future growth.

In May, Porter secured $200 million in Series F funding co-led by Kedaara Capital and Wellington Management, with participation from existing investor Vitruvian Partners. The funding round, valuing the Bengaluru-based logistics firm at $1.2 billion, will be used to scale operations, enhance technology, expand its workforce, and build a sustainable logistics network. 

This marks a significant milestone for Porter, which focuses on providing a technology-driven, asset-light logistics platform for small businesses and gig workers across urban India, and was previously valued at $1 billion.

Porter's evolution from startup to a leading Indian logistics company demonstrates technology's power to address real-world challenges. Focused on innovation and customer satisfaction, Porter is poised to spearhead the transformation of India's logistics sector, crucial for reducing costs and improving efficiency, said Srivastava.