Microsoft Workloads on AWS
More Microsoft workloads run on AWS than any other cloud provider - including Microsoft Azure. AWS gives you the ability to build, deploy, scale, and manage Microsoft applications. Running Microsoft workloads on AWS is fast, easy, secure, and can even save you money.
Private cloud or the public cloud after all? Where is the best place for your Microsoft workloads?
Microsoft applications have long been a key choice for businesses. Many companies have built their foundations on Microsoft solutions. Therefore, making the right decision on how to move them to the public cloud is critical.
When comparing the current cloud providers in the market, AWS has been able to evolve the most compared to its competitors such as Microsoft Azure or Google Cloud Platform with more than 13 years. This also applies to the operation of Microsoft workloads, which has been possible since the beginning of the AWS Cloud. Enterprises choose AWS in a direct comparison because the cloud provider has the most experience with Microsoft applications in the cloud and is also the best platform for Windows as well as SQL servers.
Amazon Web Services & 13 years of public cloud
AWS has helped and guided a large number of enterprises, regardless of size, to achieve their migration goals since the cloud platform's inception some 13 years ago.
To do this, AWS uses an end-of-support migration program that migrates legacy Windows Server applications to the latest supported versions of Windows Server on AWS. The AWS Migration Program for Windows provides best practices, tools, and incentives to reduce the complexity and cost of migrating to the cloud with support from AWS partners and professional services.
What Microsoft workloads should you run on AWS?
Exchange, Sharepoint, SQL, RDS, System Center, and .Net applications are popular options for organizations looking to run Microsoft workloads on AWS.
With Amazon Web Services you get flexibility, both standard and custom Microsoft applications and workloads can be run as long or as short as needed. For example, if you are running SQL Server, you can choose from a range of versions, editions, and deployment options by choosing to run on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) or Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS).
How Microsoft Workloads on AWS can improve your enterprise cloud.
Enterprises are constantly looking for ways to leverage the public/public cloud to increase profits and improve efficiency. A large number of enterprises have been running Microsoft workloads on AWS for more than 13 years. This is a testament to a platform that has a reputation for high performance and reliability, as well as world-class security, migration support, cost of ownership, and flexible licensing options.
The benefits of this leading-edge technology include:
- Reliability: because AWS provides globally distributed availability zones, there is less downtime than the next largest cloud provider.
- Lower costs: AWS helps customers save on compute costs for Microsoft workloads through pricing models such as Spot and a full set of Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instances.
- Superior security: With a suite of security, compliance, and governance services, AWS outperforms the next largest cloud provider.
- Faster performance: SQL Server on AWS consistently shows better performance compared to other cloud providers when using a TPC-C-like benchmark tool.
AWS offers comprehensive and exciting features
AWS supports everything you need to modernize Windows-based applications in the cloud, offering reliability and best-in-class performance in addition to a wide range of services.
- Higher reliability and performance: AWS has a robust global infrastructure with 77 availability zones in 24 regions. When you move your Microsoft workloads to AWS, your customers and stakeholders can benefit from a 98 percent reduction in unplanned downtime, a 71 percent acceleration in deployment, and a 26 percent increase in developer productivity. In addition, AWS delivers better performance and up to 62 percent lower cost for a SQL Server workload compared to the next largest cloud provider.
- Greater security and identity services: AWS offers 230 security, compliance, and governance services and features. With the AWS Nitro System - the underlying platform for EC2 instances - virtualization functions are offloaded to dedicated hardware and software, minimizing the attack surface. With AWS Identity Services, you can manage identities and credentials at scale while providing options for managing your employee, partner, and customer data.
- Lower total cost of ownership: customers can accelerate growth, increase efficiency, and achieve long-term cost reductions by running Windows on AWS. On the cost side, organizations can reduce five-year operating costs by 56% and infrastructure costs by 37%. AWS also offers customers powerful pricing models that deliver savings of up to 72% on Amazon EC2 instances, reducing the cost of compute instances for fault-tolerant workloads by up to 90%.
Getting your Microsoft workloads started in the AWS Cloud.
In a head-to-head comparison of the various leading cloud platforms, Amazon Web Services clearly shows who is winning the race, not only through technological facts, but also through its experience advantage. The benefits for your Microsoft workloads on AWS are versatile and also customizable.
To get started and migrate your Microsoft workloads to the AWS cloud, it is advisable to consult a cloud expert who has already performed numerous migrations.