GÉANT and Microsoft partnership helps Research and Education communities achieve quicker breakthroughs with cloud technology

September 27 2017, Cambridge, UK and Amsterdam, NL: GÉANT, Europe’s leading collaboration on network and related infrastructure for research and education, today announced the latest achievement in a successful multi-year partnership with Microsoft to make powerful cloud computing environments more accessible to the research and education communities.

The agreement between GÉANT, 36 National Research and Education Networks (NRENs), Microsoft and ten approved Microsoft resellers are part of GÉANT’s Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) framework, and provides a cloud-based offering tailor-made for the research and education community in 36 European countries, based on Microsoft Azure, and available through GÉANT’s innovative Cloud Catalogue.

Thousands of universities, schools and research institutions can now benefit from Microsoft Azure cloud services with procurement, contracting and integration taken care of by GÉANT and the NREN community under a common GÉANT IaaS framework agreement, making Microsoft Azure cloud computing an easy-to-use option for the research and education communities, with greater cost-effectiveness, and dedicated support. Key benefits include:

• Institutions can buy and use Microsoft Azure directly, without the need for complex and time-consuming tenders and contract procedures; and benefit from volume discounts.
• Framework contracts are compliant with EU privacy and data security regulations.
• Users can log in to the Microsoft Azure services using single sign-on (SSO), via their institutional identity management solutions.
• Network traffic costs are significantly reduced, with Microsoft Azure services connected to the high-performance data networks provided by GÉANT and its NREN partners.
•  Support is available for moving workloads to Microsoft Azure.
• Existing Microsoft licensing arrangements can be leveraged through BYOL (bring your own licensing).
• Enterprise cloud management tools enable control, oversight and delegation to a community of users and group.

Microsoft, GÉANT and the NRENs have collaborated closely for many years to enable the research and education community to benefit from advancements in technology, including cloud computing, which can help accelerate breakthroughs in research as well as enhance and optimise student engagement and institutional operations.

Erik Huizer, GÉANT Interim Chief Executive Officer, said, “The GÉANT Cloud Catalogue is already delivering significant benefits to users across the European research and education communities. We are excited to have Microsoft Azure on this platform, further expanding choice and supporting our NREN partners in the cloud services they can offer to their customers.” 

[easy-tweet tweet=”Microsoft Azure is the perfect choice for research and education institutions” hashtags=”Microsoft, IaaS”]

Anthony Salcito, Vice President of Worldwide Education at Microsoft added: “Microsoft Azure is the perfect choice for research and education institutions. It allows quick access to powerful computing environments where complex data can be stored and shared easily and securely. It also gives researchers access to tools that can turn data into insights and enable them to collaborate with others quickly and securely to accelerate discovery. We are delighted to bring these benefits and opportunities to the research and education communities across the EMEA region through the GÉANT IaaS framework agreement.”