Many organisations do not have a complete understanding of the total number of applications they have or who uses them. Applications require servers, take up storage space, and require load balancers, security services and a range of other support technologies. Many applications are either very rarely used or their functionality has been superseded by a new application, but they still operate on a large technology infrastructure consuming space, power and cooling, as well as support and operations services. Application consolidation is a strategy to discover and document an organisation's application footprint, and then move to rationalise because of obsolescence, improved functionality elsewhere, or because of a wider strategy of application transformation. Application consolidation in itself provides an opportunity to engage in further more aggressive server virtualisation. There are many approaches to application consolidation, but ultimately, the goal is to operate a streamlined application strategy that fully supports the business.