By Richard Warner, AVS Lead, Microsoft Asia
As Southeast Asian nations move at different stages towards economic recovery and remote working and learning remains largely the norm, cloud continues to be a key enabler to unlocking innovation and greater business growth potential for many.
In Southeast Asia, the cloud market will continue to witness new opportunities for innovation and growth, coupled with the strategic location of Singapore and Microsoft being one of the largest interconnected networks. According to IDC, the market in this region is expected to reach US$40.32 billion by 2025. Singapore sits at the heart of this growth, with many of our customers starting their cloud journeys here.
But the reality is that not every company was born in the cloud, and most are starting from a place where processes, culture and infrastructure have been established for years. There is more that can be done to simplify the move to the cloud and maximize technology investments, as we pave the way for businesses to further innovate and grow at a faster pace.
Moving to the cloud – it’s not just pressing a button
We understand many organizations are faced with challenges when looking to migrate their legacy applications to the cloud. Most notably, a lack of cloud skilling, risk of business disruption and concerns around refactoring complexities. A recent study by TECHAnalysis found that 70% of today’s applications are still being run in the corporate data center and private or hybrid clouds. Along with these apps, many organizations also continue to rely on VMware and Microsoft solutions in these data centers. Years of investment, skillsets and costs have been spent on operating them and one thing is clear – “Moving to the cloud” is not as simple as just pressing a button.
Microsoft recognizes that not every organization is on the same page and as a leading technology provider in the new world of intelligent cloud and edge, enabling organizations in their digital transformation journeys is at the core of what we do. This means meeting businesses at the stage of transformation they are in, providing them with the solutions that are tailor fit for their business needs, and empowering them with the capabilities to create their own future. How do we then leverage the foundational aspects of the cloud such that it extracts more value from existing technology investments, as well as bring intelligence into operations, and innovation and agility to businesses?
Partnership to empower our customers to achieve more
We have moved past the phase where adopting the latest technologies was the trend, and more companies are instead seeking ways to develop their own digital capabilities to meet customers’ emerging expectations. Microsoft believes investing in partnerships to innovate, grow and deliver on the promise of digital transformation for customers across organizations and industries.
To achieve this, the industry partnerships we embark on play a very crucial role in encouraging a culture of tech intensity towards co-innovation. Microsoft and VMware have been collaborating to ensure Microsoft products like Windows Server, run seamlessly in VMware virtualization environments. This time, partnering once again with VMware solidifies our commitment towards nurturing our leading partner ecosystem and signifies a milestone of how far we have come, helping our partners and customers future-proof their businesses and strengthen resiliency.
Accelerate and simplify the path to cloud
Having worked with thousands of customers running apps in their data centers on Microsoft and VMware solutions, we are cognizant of their needs and challenges which have become even more pressing today. And we want to help them further simplify the move to the cloud and ensure minimal disruption to their business as they innovate and transform.
One of the fastest ways to reap the benefits of the cloud is to leverage existing IT systems, apps and
workloads natively in Azure without the need to make modifications prior. Azure VMware Solution (AVS)
delivers a comprehensive VMware environment in Azure allowing businesses to run their on-premises
VMware workloads natively, without the need to refactor or re-IP workloads, and at the same time capitalizing on their existing VMware investments.
In addition to a simplified approach to run VMware workloads, businesses can expect to unlock the power of modernization though Azure PaaS services allowing them to seamlessly utilize services like Azure Management, Security and Storage. These are wrapped up under existing support and billing contracts which enable our customers to optimize business processes and deliver greater efficiencies.
Being able to unlock the power of modernization, optimize business processes, build resiliency and deliver greater efficiencies are key ingredients to gaining that competitive edge – which is especially vital during these volatile times. Looking ahead, those that seize the opportunities of cloud today will emerge stronger and more streamlined, as they take the right steps to set themselves up for success now and in the future.
To learn more about AVS, see here. Generally available in Southeast Asia for the first time, AVS will empower customers to take that first step of fast-tracking their journey to achieving true digital transformation with a free 30-day trial (only in Singapore).
