Organizations find numerous advantages to running workloads in the cloud, but managing the subscription billing isn’t generally one of them. As CDW works with organizations to manage their cloud services, we have learned that the work required to decipher invoices, ferret out efficiencies and otherwise manage these environments can be considerable.

That’s why we invite organizations to simplify their subscriptions — and take advantage of our complementary managed services support — by moving them from Microsoft Azure Enterprise Agreements (EAs) to Azure from CDW. The entire process takes about two weeks, start to finish, and requires no downtime.

CDW has been a Gold-level Microsoft partner for more than a decade, and last year, we were proud to become an Azure Expert Managed Services Provider. That designation reflects the exceptional engineering and technical support that we provide as a valuable partner for our customers.

With Azure, organizations have many choices to make, from which services to use to how to purchase, manage and govern its use. In October 2019, Microsoft announced changes to the volume licensing programs in ways that affected a customer’s ability to acquire Azure. Specifically, Microsoft:

1. Will no longer write new Azure-only Server and Cloud Enrollment (SCE) agreements
2. Will no longer renew Azure-only SCE agreements and subject any extended contracts to a 3 percent administrative fee
3. Will no longer allow Azure to be added to existing Enterprise Agreement (EA) contracts

Becoming an Azure Expert MSP required a companywide effort spanning multiple teams, bringing together expertise from across our global organization. We worked extremely hard to demonstrate to an independent third party that our experience in these solutions is best in class.

So what does this status mean for customers? That through our CDW Amplified™ Azure Managed Services, we provide consistent processes, tools, skills and technology to ensure successful delivery of repeatable, complex solutions based on Microsoft Azure. Learn more about our three-step approach.

Due to various factors such as cost-efficiency, flexibility and availability, organizations are trying to leverage the infrastructure from various cloud providers such as AWS, Azure, Google and IBM. Within the CDW cloud practice, we are finding that organizations are taking different paths. Some organizations are in an early experimental stage as they try to understand the various capabilities provided by the cloud, while other customers are fully operating in the cloud.

Judging from search engine traffic — and from the calls I receive — there’s some confusion out there about hybrid cloud and multicloud. In truth, both are completely viable models, with various organizations relying on each to achieve significant business benefits. But before IT and business leaders can decide which approach makes the most sense for them, they need to step back and ask themselves what outcomes they are trying to achieve.

Microsoft recently released Windows Virtual Desktop and CDW is one of Microsoft’s few partners that is already delivering projects with this technology. I am one of the engineers who has been working with WVD and this blog post will cover what can be expected from it. Getting Started with Windows Virtual Desktop If you are…