Cloud

Nutanix .NEXT 2020: HCI Clusters Are Now Available on Microsoft Azure

Nutanix software is fully integrated with two of the biggest cloud platforms.

Bob is the managing editor of BizTech magazine.

Kicking off its annual .NEXT virtual user conference, Nutanix announced a key new partnership with Microsoft, declaring it will now offer Nutanix clusters on the Azure cloud platform.

“What if you could have all of Nutanix running inside Azure?” said Nutanix CEO Dheeraj Pandey, announcing the news during his keynote address at the Global .NEXT Digital Experience, which runs through Sept. 11. “That’s the big deal — that’s something we really want to talk about over the next few days.”

Along with a similar partnership with Amazon Web Services, announced in August, Nutanix software is now fully integrated with two of the world’s biggest public cloud platforms. The deals come as Nutanix continues its own shift from a hyperconverged infrastructure software company to one focused on hybrid cloud computing.

“We know customers are looking for solutions to truly — and simply — advance their cloud journey,” explained Tarkan Maner, Nutanix’s chief commercial officer. “This partnership helps us deliver a single software stack across public and private clouds, resulting in increased agility, streamlined operations and significant cost savings.”

Nutanix Strives to Make IT Infrastructure Invisible

Pandey framed the partnerships as the latest steps in Nutanix’s long-term goal of lowering the visibility of IT infrastructure, reducing “chaos” for IT leaders and end users alike while making corporate networks simpler to manage. “As a company, we have taken everything that used to be visible, the nuts and bolts of infrastructure, and we have made that invisible,” he said. “That’s been true of all the complexities of buying stuff, of using stuff and of managing your IT operations around you. We’ve taken it from visible to invisible.”

Nutanix .NEXT comes during a period of transition for the company, which announced on Aug. 27 the departure of Pandey, who founded the business 11 years ago, from the company’s leadership. Pandey, who previously said he decided to depart for personal reasons, made only an oblique reference to the change during his keynote, saying he, too, would be going from “visible leader” to invisible presence.

In addition to offering Nutanix clusters on Microsoft Azure, the companies said they will offer:

Unified sales and support: Microsoft Azure customers will be able to use their existing Azure credits to purchase Nutanix software; in turn, Nutanix customers can port their existing term licenses to Azure or get on-demand consumption of Nutanix software through the Azure Marketplace.
Integration with Azure Arc:The companies will enable IT teams to manage servers, containers and data services on Nutanix HCI, on-premises or in Azure, through the Azure Arc control plane.

WATCH: Looking to rein in IT infrastructure costs, especially amid business disruption? Watch this free session to learn how.

Scott Guthrie, executive vice president of Microsoft’s cloud and artificial intelligence group, said the COVID-19 pandemic has made partnerships such as the one with Nutanix more urgent, as businesses are turning more to the cloud as they revamp IT operations in the midst of all-remote work environments.

“We’ve seen a number of business, technology and financial factors that are changing the way businesses are organized and managed, and that’s meant more cloud adoption,” Guthrie said. “We’ve seen more companies moving to remote work, and that’s meant big adoption of Teams and solutions like Windows Virtual Desktop. The thing that’s top of mind is how do you do it faster, and how you meet customers where they are today?”

Whether or not you’re attending Nutanix . NEXT 2020 on Sept. 9 and 10, follow us on Twitter at @BizTechMagazine, or the official conference Twitter account, #NextConf. And keep this page bookmarked for all the coverage from the BizTech team.

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