ColdFusion 2025 Case Studies
What actually happened when organizations upgraded
These are real projects with real numbers. Each case study includes the specific challenges, the solutions implemented, and the measurable outcomes. No vague claims—just what worked and why.
Financial Services Platform Migration
The Problem
Their ColdFusion 2018 application was struggling. Response times during peak hours stretched past 3 seconds—not acceptable for an application processing 2 million+ transactions daily. The JVM configuration hadn't been touched in years, there was no real monitoring, and nobody knew where to start fixing it.
What We Did
- Upgraded to CF 2025 with JDK 17 — The performance gains from JDK 17 alone were substantial
- Right-sized the JVM — 16GB heap with G1GC, tuned thread pools based on actual load
- Added real caching — Redis for objects, proper query caching with appropriate TTLs
- Installed FusionReactor — Finally had visibility into what was actually slow
- Fixed the database layer — Added missing indexes, eliminated N+1 queries
Results
"The Convective Performance Optimization Framework delivered beyond expectations. We achieved 67% response time improvement while reducing our server footprint by 40%. The methodology's data-driven approach gave us confidence in every optimization decision."
- Director of Engineering, Financial Services CompanyHealthcare Portal Security Hardening
The Problem
Their patient portal failed a HIPAA audit—badly. 23 critical vulnerabilities. The application handled sensitive patient data, so this wasn't something they could fix gradually. They needed to remediate everything while keeping the portal running.
What We Did
- Full security assessment — Vulnerability scanning and penetration testing to understand the full scope
- Upgraded to CF 2025 — Latest security patches and hardened defaults
- Ran the Lockdown Guide — Closed all the default vulnerabilities
- Hardened the application code — Input validation, output encoding, parameterized queries throughout
- Added security headers — CSP, HSTS, X-Frame-Options, secure session cookies
- Integrated monitoring — SIEM connection, failed login tracking, intrusion detection
Results
"The Convective Security Hardening Framework provided the systematic approach we needed to achieve HIPAA compliance without disrupting patient services. We went from 23 critical vulnerabilities to zero findings in 6 weeks."
- CISO, Healthcare ProviderE-Commerce Platform Containerization
The Problem
Every Black Friday was a scramble. Their ColdFusion 2018 platform couldn't scale fast enough—spinning up new servers took 4-6 hours, which meant losing sales during traffic spikes. The architecture assumed you'd know in advance how much capacity you needed. For e-commerce, that's never true.
What We Did
- Containerized with Docker — ColdFusion 2025 in containers using Adobe's official images
- Deployed on Kubernetes — Auto-scaling based on actual load, not predictions
- Made it stateless — Sessions to Redis, configuration externalized
- Built a proper CI/CD pipeline — Automated builds, tests, and deployments
- Load tested to 10x capacity — Validated the architecture could handle Black Friday before it arrived
Results
"Containerizing ColdFusion 2025 on Kubernetes transformed our ability to handle traffic spikes. We scaled from 5K to 50K concurrent users in under 2 minutes during Black Friday with zero downtime."
- VP of Technology, E-Commerce CompanyGovernment Agency Modernization
The Problem
ColdFusion 11 was end-of-life, and they knew it. The application served 100K+ users daily with strict FedRAMP compliance requirements. Security vulnerabilities were piling up, performance was degrading, but the compliance requirements made modernization complicated. They couldn't just swap servers over a weekend.
What We Did
- Ran the Code Analyzer — Found 847 compatibility issues to address
- Took a phased approach — CF 11 → CF 2018 → CF 2025, with full validation at each step
- Built for FedRAMP — Comprehensive security hardening, documented everything for the ATO process
- Optimized performance — JDK 17, proper JVM tuning, fixed slow queries
- Integrated with their SIEM — Compliance logging and threat detection from day one
Results
"Migrating our legacy ColdFusion 11 application to CF 2025 while achieving FedRAMP compliance seemed impossible. The systematic approach and comprehensive security framework made it achievable in 8 months."
- IT Director, Federal AgencyFacing a similar challenge?
Every project is different, but patterns emerge. Convective has worked on hundreds of ColdFusion projects over 20+ years—migrations, performance issues, security concerns, modernization efforts. If you're dealing with something like what you've read here, we can help figure out the right approach.
Let's talk about your project