Top Ten Microsoft Azure business benefits
When all is said and done, the real role of any technology is to facilitate the improvement of something else, in this case, the business. While many companies have adopted a cloud based model, we happen to think there are ten really great benefits that businesses experience if they embrace Microsoft Azure [feel free to disagree below].
It’s important to note there are a variety of Cloud IaaS [Infrastructure as a Service] Providers available for businesses, including Amazon Web Services, Rackspace Hosting and Google Computer Engine. However, we think that Microsoft Azure really is a class to itself when it comes to practical business solutions.
It is more than a pure increase in numbers, but quantifiable services including analytics, computing, databases, mobile apps, networking, storage and websites. With this in your competitor’s hands, they have real means to outpace and out-muscle you.
So, what are they getting that you’re not?
1. Azure is fast
Azure’s speed of deployment, speed of operation, scalability and functionality simply can’t be matched by on-premises or even other cloud providers.
2. Azure is agile
Businesses using Azure can develop, test, feedback and retry when developing their applications. This means that they can explore new avenues and new technologies.
More importantly they have the ability try features and decide if it’s not for them, without expensive outlay or setting up complex infrastructure. With innovation being essential to all business, this has a huge impact.
3. Azure has a wide Global reach
Businesses using Azure can have their services running in datacentres globally, with great ease. This gives them the power to modify the global footprint of their application dynamically as performance and utilization changes.
From a user’s perspective, they are always getting a great experience and aren’t dependant on location.
4. Azure has a fully integrated development environment
They have Visual Studio — the world’s leading development environment and the tools to build Azure solutions are baked straight in.
This is a real game-changing advantage to developers, and demonstrates Microsoft Azure’s business focus.
5. Azure has a fully integrated delivery pipeline
They have Source control, unit testing, integration testing, delivery and go live tools — all the tools are available under one umbrella. This avoids problems that occur when you try and mesh together a group of products.
6. Azure has automated tools for failover and disaster recovery
They have In-built failover and disaster recovery capability.
They have regional and global failover options, Hot and Cold Standby models as well as rolling reboot capabilities that work out of the box. These capabilities put them far beyond the, plain-old storage option.
7. Azure has the ability to flex expenditure to achieve business benefit
They can spend more to get more; if they want it done faster or with more volume, they can use Azure to put more resources to work.
This means that no matter whether it be seasonality, or whatever change in need, there is no restructure of infrastructure needed.
8. Azure is secure
They can provide secure and seamless logon for their users — business to business or for individuals. Their customers can use familiar accounts such as Facebook, or LinkedIn to login to services. Not storing user credentials means they’re less likely to be hacked.
We understand that passwords are an ever problematic issue for organisation, especially to users with high data privileges. Azure Single Sign-on helps eliminate a great deal of that.
9. Azure is Compliant
They can rely on Microsoft having done the heavy lifting when it comes to Compliance — and with the finance industry coming under more pressure than ever before, this will enable great resource reallocation.
10. Azure can be depoyed anywhere
Ok — maybe not yet — but with the coming of Azure Stack (Q4 2016) they can use their data centre as if it’s Azure. They can use a single model to deploy on-premises and to the cloud.
Now, that’s exciting!
With all that in mind
If you can afford to ignore the 10 Microsoft Azure business benefits above, then good for you.
However, if you really want to see the power it can give to your organisation, and the impacts that means, you should really access your Cloud options.
We’d love to hear your thoughts on the matter below.
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