SAP on Azure: the Microsoft Cloud Advantage

amandaburkhardt

SAP on Azure: the Microsoft Cloud Advantage

Even though making use of the cloud isn’t quite the daring leap it used to be, it can still be an intimidating venture, especially when it comes to hosting mission-critical applications. But the potential benefits of effectively utilizing the cloud have become undeniable, leading many of today’s forward-thinking enterprises to digital transformation by moving workloads there. Deploying SAP on Azure lets you to take advantage of the best that both platforms have to offer, and Rackspace can be your guide throughout that journey, capable of handling solution design, migration, management and continued optimization.

Why SAP on Azure?

Azure is a robust, powerful and mature cloud platform with an established record of reliability. Its expansive reach, with 42 Azure regions available worldwide, also makes it an appealing platform for enterprises across the globe. In fact, more than 90 percent of Fortune 500 companies currently use Azure in some capacity. As an SAP partner, Microsoft continually makes advancements to enhance interoperability between Azure and SAP applications, even going so far as to deploy SAP internally. This means you can trust Azure to maintain compatibility with the latest SAP and SAP HANA versions as well as handle sizable workloads. Scalability and performance — Deploying SAP applications on Azure provides the agility and scalability we’ve come to expect from the cloud. This agility allows you to ramp up resources when you need them most, and scale them back down when they’re not needed, so you only use (and pay for?) what you need, when you need it. Using Azure also means not having to deal with the upfront costs of deploying a hardware-based solution or the eventual need to upgrade outdated and end-of-life equipment. Azure doesn’t skimp on performance either. You can use an environment tuned specifically for SAP HANA to get unparalleled performance from a platform that can grow as your business does. Intelligence — Data and analytics are vital resources for all organizations, and Azure has native support for Microsoft intelligence tools, including Microsoft Analytics and Insights and Microsoft Power BI. Drawing data from multiple streams can significantly improve the effectiveness of the analytics to help you make better and more informed business decisions based on mountains of data. Security and compliance — Compliance requirements were once considered to be barriers for customers who wanted to adopt the cloud, but Microsoft has proven itself to be a leader in data protection and privacy. Layering our managed security services expertise and compliance assistance on top of Azure security capabilities allows organizations from several regulated industries to maintain compliant cloud solutions managed by Rackspace.

Why Rackspace?

 Like any major operational decision, using SAP on Azure is an investment, and you want to be sure you get the best return on that investment. As the #1 managed cloud provider, Rackspace has the expertise, experience, and global reach to provide you with an end-to-end solution to help you make the most out your environment. Our broad portfolio gives customers the confidence to embark on their cloud journey and modernize their IT. We provide 24x7x365 access to a dedicated account team with in-depth knowledge about your environment and priorities. Rackspace is the only 5x Microsoft Hosting Partner of the Year; we also have achieved gold competency in several categories, including Cloud Productivity, Application Development, Cloud Platform, and Hosting. We also have hundreds of Microsoft-certified experts, with more than 2,000 certifications among them. Our experts provide:

  • Architecture guidance
  • Configuration assistance
  • Detailed design documentation
  • Resource deployment
  • Escalation support
  • Change and incident management
  • OS Sspport
  • Account reporting

The service management team can also help you create a custom monitoring response runbook, so you can dictate how we respond to monitoring alerts, helping us keep your business running. Rackspace offers a number of additional services for Azure, including:

  • Migration Assistance
  • Database Support
  • Rackspace Application Services
  • Rackspace Managed Security
  • Custom DevOps Professional Services
  • DevOps Maturity & Strategy Planning

Download our e-book for more information on how Rackspace can help you deploy and manage SAP on Azure, or visit us here.