Digital Strategy Manager at a energy/utilities company with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Has a single sign-on functionality and a user friendly interface
Pros and Cons
  • "I think the single sign-on functionality and the ease with which you can deposit things on the cloud have been valuable. Azure has very robust security functionalities and authentication features, which come with mobility, along with backup and credential checks."
  • "Integration with other services could be much better."

What is our primary use case?

We have a complete Microsoft ecosystem. Azure comes with a variety of parts such as infrastructure as a service and platform as a service or SaaS. We are using it for infrastructure as a service and software as a service as well, so both SaaS and IaaS are being used.

All of our solutions are being deployed on the Azure server. We use the Azure authentication functionality across our organization, which is a single sign-on functionality, so it is Azure-based. We also are incorporating the DevOps framework, which, again, is being integrated to Azure. Our complete backbone is being moved to Azure, and most of our systems are moving to the cloud version.

What is most valuable?

I think the single sign-on functionality and the ease with which you can deposit things on the cloud have been valuable.

Azure has very robust security functionalities and authentication features, which come with mobility, along with backup and credential checks.

Scalability is also very robust because you can deploy the solutions on the go, and along with that, it provides you an ecosystem to integrate with the existing Microsoft products. For example, we have Power BI, and it's very nicely integrated with the Azure cloud version.

The interface is quite user friendly and intuitive. The reporting is perfect as well.

What needs improvement?

Integration with other services could be much better.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been using Microsoft Azure for over two years now.

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What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability is very good. As it is a Microsoft product, the reliability is very good.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Because it's a cloud-based solution, scalability is not an issue at all. We currently have over 200 development team members using Microsoft Azure.

How are customer service and support?

Technical support staff have been responsive, and the support was good.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was a bit complex. It was getting ruled out sometimes, but it was at a Pan-India level. So, it was expected to take some time; it took about 8 to 12 months. Overall, it was good.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I believe that we have a three-year license, and I'm happy with the pricing.

What other advice do I have?

I think Azure works best when you have the complete Microsoft ecosystem. Then, you get the real value out of it. In my firm, we have the complete enterprise licensing model. So, we have an integrated ecosystem, which provides a very collaborative way of working, along with the ease of creating.

If I were to rate Microsoft Azure on a scale from one to ten, I would rate it at nine.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Private Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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NitinKumar - PeerSpot reviewer
NitinKumarDirector of Enginnering at Sigmoid
Top 20Real User

Have you used Azure Data Governance tool Purview ? If yes, what's your view and is it mature enough?

PeerSpot user
CTO at a healthcare company with 51-200 employees
Vendor
The management console needs work but we would not be building the Healthcare IT application if it were not for Azure.

What is most valuable?

The fully integrated capabilities of a PaaS service.

How has it helped my organization?

Basically we would not be building the Healthcare IT application if it were not for Azure.

What needs improvement?

The management console needs work and the pricing calculator is truly user hostile.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the solution 3 years.

What was my experience with deployment of the solution?

We have some issues with functional differences between Azure Active Directory and how Ad is implemented on a standalone server.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We have had a few outages with Visual Studio Online – though they have not been a major work impact.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

None so far.

How are customer service and technical support?

Customer Service: Mixed. Microsoft still has too many support queues and if you end up in the wrong one you can spend hours being bounced from one to the other. OTOH once you figure out how to get to the Business support queue – response times are fantastic for “business outage” issues.Technical Support: When in the right queue – the understanding is unparalleled.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have previously used AWS and Amazon Elastic Beanstalk. Azure is a PaaS whereas AWS is a server stack environment and thus AWS does not provide the OpEx cost reductions that Azure does. Elastic Beanstalk is a PaaS but it is not as fully developed as Azure.NET is.

How was the initial setup?

Very straightforward. In fact almost too much so. Its easy to try and overthink the setup and waste time looking for things you don’t need to be looking for.

What about the implementation team?

Combination of in-house and vendor. Vendor team was new to Azure.

What was our ROI?

Full ROI on the current project is still to be determined as we are not shipping yet. But I would estimate a 100% cost reduction over the traditional way of building a server based app.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Our monthly dev costs for infrastucture are running $300-$500 for the initial work and we expect to have full OpEx costs of $1,000-$3,000/mo once we are launched.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

AWS and Elastic Beanstalk.

What other advice do I have?

Have a team that understands .NET development and particularly someone who understands Active Directory very well
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
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Microsoft Azure
March 2024
Learn what your peers think about Microsoft Azure. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: March 2024.
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Data engineer at Inicon S.r.l.
Real User
Top 5Leaderboard
A comprehensive environment for implementing a data platform
Pros and Cons
  • "The solution provides multiple well integrated services which happen to work together seamlessly and provide flexibility and scalability for use cases all around the industry."
  • "The cost calculation for the services can be an unclear aspect which makes it difficult to estimate the expenses incurred accurately."

What is our primary use case?

We utilize various Azure services such as Azure SQL, Azure Cosmos DB, Azure Data Factory, Azure Storage, and Azure Key Vault to build our data platform.

What is most valuable?

One of the features that I really like about Azure is its comprehensive environment for implementing a data platform. The solution provides multiple well integrated services which happen to work together seamlessly and provides flexibility and scale ability for use cases all around the industry.

I also like the Key Vault and Azure Active Directory which I use as essential services to manage user authentication and authorisation for various data sets within the platform.

What needs improvement?

There are some minor aspects which require improvement but they are very technical for an explanation. For example, the cost calculation for the services can be an unclear aspect which makes it difficult to estimate the expenses incurred accurately. Therefore, it will be beneficial to have it more transparent and apply your user-friendly cost estimation process to help users plan their budgets in a more efficient manner.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Microsoft Azure for the past 5 to 6 years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

I would rate it 9 out of 10 since it is stable but can get better.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I would rate the scalability 8 out of 10. The number of users on a platform is high but we do not have active engagement from all the users all the time. We have over 100 users but not all of them interact with the platform regularly. Keeping it aside, our main focus still remains on building data platforms which cater to different needs.

How are customer service and support?

I have mixed feelings about Microsoft's technical support. While they do try to assist most of the time, I believe there's room for improvement. 

How would you rate customer service and support?

Neutral

How was the initial setup?

As a data engineer, I mainly use these services rather than being involved in their implementation.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend Azure since it offers a variety of features and services which work together. This is quite rare in other platforms because they are not scalable. These features have helped us to promote our growth without any major challenges. The wide range of services make it a valuable option for implementing a data platform. However it is really difficult to quantify its value numerically. Different companies can Paradise different factors such as scalability, cost, or support which makes it different for each company.

It is important to keep in mind that there are also challenges such as the complex nature of estimating costs and no realistic expectations of savings due to the presence of hidden costs. Azure is an efficient solution but it requires improvement in terms of stability, support and pricing.

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Implementer
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Managing director at antarymain solutions
Real User
Top 5
A scalable and stable tool that provides various valuable features under one roof
Pros and Cons
  • "I get all the features under one roof."
  • "The subscriptions are complicated."

What is our primary use case?

We use the email accounts and SharePoint. We want to use the AI and OCR services, but we do not have many use cases.

What is most valuable?

I get all the features under one roof.

What needs improvement?

The subscriptions are complicated. The process is not user-friendly.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using the solution for almost one year.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The tool’s stability is good.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The tool is scalable. Around 30 people use the solution in our organization. We are trying to get projects from Europe and North America. Once we get more projects, we will be scaling up.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is straightforward. It took me around one week to set up the product. I did the deployment myself since I am into IT.

What was our ROI?

The return on investment is good because everything is in the cloud. We save a lot on infrastructure costs and server costs.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

I pay a yearly subscription fee for the solution. The pricing is normal compared to other service providers. I can increase or decrease my subscription based on my organization's needs.

What other advice do I have?

We are into data management. We do a lot of data consumption and data validation. We need a lot of virtual solutions and storage solutions to process data. I would recommend the solution to others. Overall, I rate the tool a nine out of ten.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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AbasoJadhav - PeerSpot reviewer
Team Lead at Tech Mahindra Limited
Real User
Top 10
Feature rich, simple deployment, and good support
Pros and Cons
  • "The most valuable feature of Microsoft Azure is the Area feature. Additionally, the SQL Server DB as a serverless pool is useful, storage-wide external tables are helpful, and PolyBase is very good at reading external data. The capacity of Synapse to analyze in analytics is very good and it supports a range of data."
  • "The scalability could improve."

What is our primary use case?

We are using Microsoft Azure for many purposes in our project. We have a cloud-based SQL Server and we are bringing data to Azure DB through the Area feature. We are using SQL Server as a database, and from there we are using the data for analysis. We are doing forecasting using all the data. 

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature of Microsoft Azure is the Area feature. Additionally, the SQL Server DB as a serverless pool is useful, storage-wide external tables are helpful, and PolyBase is very good at reading external data. The capacity of Synapse to analyze in analytics is very good and it supports a range of data.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Microsoft Azure for approximately one year.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The scalability could improve.

We have many teams that are using this solution in different projects.

I rate the scalability of Microsoft Azure a four out of five.

How are customer service and support?

We did not contact the support from Microsoft Azure often.

I rate the support from Microsoft Azure a four out of five.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I did not use another solution prior to Microsoft Azure.

How was the initial setup?

The deployment of Microsoft Azure is easy because it is cloud-based.

What about the implementation team?

We have one person that can deploy Microsoft Azure when they have proper access rights. If the project is small it can be seamless. For example, I'm handling a 10 to 12 person team, and for deployment, one person that has all access writes can deploy Microsoft Azure seamlessly.

What other advice do I have?

I would recommend this solution to others.

I rate Microsoft Parallel Data Warehouse an eight out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Strategic Sourcing Manager at a financial services firm with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
An absolutely stable solution that allows us to scale up and down as needed
Pros and Cons
  • "The ability to scale down is a big thing."
  • "It can be improved in terms of ease of billing or monitoring of the billing. That gets to be a little difficult."

What is our primary use case?

We have our data lake on it. In terms of deployment, I believe we have a hybrid deployment.

How has it helped my organization?

We can temporarily build out an environment for different scenarios, such as testing, and when testing is done, we can shut that environment down. So, we do not have an overhead in our own data center.

What is most valuable?

The ability to scale down is a big thing.

What needs improvement?

It can be improved in terms of ease of billing or monitoring of the billing. That gets to be a little difficult.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using this solution for four years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is absolutely stable. Microsoft doesn't want to sell something that isn't.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Its scalability is excellent. You just turn something on, and it is there. We have not made any reservations on it. We can scale up and scale down as needed. There is nothing that we have that is a commitment.

We probably have about 500 users, and they are administrators, developers, BI folks who actually manipulate it and create reports, and then we have end-users for the data. They are the people that use those reports.

In terms of the plans to increase its usage, right now, we're going through a merger, which will impact the data a little bit. So, we are in a holding pattern in terms of scaling up anything until that merger gets completed.

How are customer service and support?

We go through a third party for that, and their support is really good.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were fully on-premise with some SaaS platforms, and we then moved to Azure for a part of that.

How was the initial setup?

It was complex, and that was mostly because of the security needs. We had to understand how things fit together.

The original deployment, just for testing, took about half a day, but to really get it going and to be able to allow access to people, other than the administrators, took more time. We're a financial institution, so we had to have everything monitored and secure. It probably took about four months to get it functional on the production side.

What about the implementation team?

We used a consultant. They were excellent. They knew exactly what they were talking about. They were able to give us not only what was needed presently for our deployment but also the things to think about as we let the environment grow in the future.

For its deployment and maintenance, I've got security folks who watch what's going on. They make sure that only the right people are getting the right data, and it is not being allowed to folks who shouldn't have access. I have nothing public-facing on it. I've got administrators. I've probably got three people in security and five people in the administration. We're a 24/7 business, so it is split across all of that time.

What was our ROI?

Originally, when we implemented it, it was basically in a like-for-like way, which is not the way the platform is designed. So, once we were able to really get in there and figure things out, we figured out that we could use a much smaller footprint. That helped us out quite a bit in terms of a return on investment. We are seeing probably about 75% of the regular data center cost in Azure, so there were 25% savings, but we could see that go down as testing was being eliminated over different platforms.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Currently, we do not have anything reserved. There are no reservations that we have built into the Azure environment, so all of our licensing is on a consumption basis. As things spin up, those licenses spin up.

In terms of the additional costs incurred beyond the standard licensing fee, such as for operations, it's kind of tough for me to judge because I already had a fully-staffed operations team in a fully on-premise platform environment. So, we didn't spin up anybody extra for that. It just changed what they were doing.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We evaluated other options. We decided to go with Azure because we understood the licensing and VMs and how all of that worked together. Prior to the merger, we were looking at bringing the platform onto AWS. It wasn't that we were necessarily exclusive; we just felt that this was our best first step.

What other advice do I have?

I would advise understanding what data you're going to be putting out there, and what your security requirements are for that. You should be ready to have a workshop so that everyone involved knows what's going on. Get a good understanding from the accounts payable team about how the payments are coming in and how to monitor them.

I love the product. From a procurement standpoint, I don't have a lot of control over it. Unless we've got some contracting of what we plan on doing, I don't have a lot of control over licenses, etc. An administrator can just go out, do it, and put the licensing in place, and then it is like you've got to pay for it. It doesn't function well in a P2P type of environment.

I would rate it an eight out of 10.

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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IT Technical Manager
Real User
Technical simplicity in terms of implementation; flexible and scalable
Pros and Cons
  • "Provides a high level of availability and 99% uptime."
  • "Lacks flexibility in terms of storage or resource allocation."

What is our primary use case?

We are customers of Microsoft and I'm the IT technical manager. 

What is most valuable?

The most valuable feature for me is the high level of availability and the 99% uptime of the system. I also appreciate the technical simplicity of the system in terms of implementation.

What needs improvement?

I'm currently based in the Philippines and the availability of services locally could be improved. Technically speaking, I'd like to see more flexibility in terms of storage or resource allocation. Resourcing is currently quite fixed so that if you want to move between level two and level three resources, or customize resources, you can't do that. The discrepancy in terms of costing is around $200. If they improved flexibility for selecting resources it would be easier for us to get the costing approved.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using this solution for around two years. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is stable, one of the most reliable in the Philippines. The downside is that currently all the services are outside the country. Singapore and Hong Kong provide the closest service but we have laws that prohibit certain amounts of data residing in other countries. None of that affects stability. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

One of the key takes from using cloud services is scalability and flexibility. If a company hits some roadblocks financially, they can reduce infrastructure and also reduce what they use in the cloud lowering the cost. 

How are customer service and technical support?

I've had several outages or major issues and I've had good experience with technical support. They resolved the problems in less than a day. The only downside is that in the Philippines you're dealing with the vendor and not Microsoft direct. I have two steps of support; if the vendor can't provide the support, then they escalate to Microsoft. 

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is quite simple. We currently have 20 users on the infrastructure side in addition to 20+ developers.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

We have difficulty in getting the costing approved. We pay for a virtual machine and the resources currently implemented there, then we need a license from Microsoft Windows OS and the database itself. In our latest license purchase, the manager approved a monthly fee of around $2,000 for the resources we use. If you're going to the cloud, that's currently included in the cost and will be less if you have the software assurance from Microsoft; on-prem is more expensive.

What other advice do I have?

The big takeaway on this product is the high availability of the system on cloud and reduction of on-prem costing. There are no concerns about the electrical doing some redundancy in between, cooling, purchasing, procurement of IT equipment. Instead of budgeting based on CAPEX, we're doing it from an OPEX point of view. One of the key takes for moving to the cloud is the cost. You can leverage with the cloud and let go of some things required to maintain a system on-prem, the kinds of things that alleviate some complexity in doing maintenance of the system. The solution is suitable for any size company. 

I highly recommend Microsoft Azure. Everyone knows Microsoft so the learning curve is easier. I rate the solution nine out of 10. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Hybrid Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Works at a real estate/law firm with 10,001+ employees
Real User
Good security, excellent scalability, and very stable
Pros and Cons
  • "Technical support, from what I understand, is quite helpful and we speak with them regularly."
  • "The installation process is complex."

What is our primary use case?

We don't use DevOps; we just use the Azure Cloud platform. The solution is primarily used for PaaS and FaaS.

What is most valuable?

The solution has been very stable.

We find the product to be scalable. 

The security network inside of the information on the network is very good.

Technical support, from what I understand, is quite helpful and we speak with them regularly.

What needs improvement?

There aren't really any issues with the product itself. For us, the problems are organizational and the processes inside the company, which uses Azure, aren't as clear. They need to define a good process and a good implementation strategy going forward. We only really have issues with what they want to do, and not the technology itself. Basically, the technology is not the problem. It is just the way we want to use it.

It would always be nice to have even more integration capabilities.

A company needs to have strong finance managers. It could cost a lot if you haven't got a finance function inside each company.

The installation process is complex. 

The pricing could always be better and a bit more standardized.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using the solution for five years at this point. It's been a while. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is very stable and reliable. The performance is good. It's not buggy. there aren't glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The product has been very scalable. If a company needs to expand it, it can do so.

At this time, I'm not sure exactly how many people are directly using the solution.

How are customer service and technical support?

While I haven't personally used technical support, our company does have a technical account manager on the Azure side and we are coordinating each week to identify all the topics we need to address - including our disaster recovery plan, which is important to the company right now. 

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We did not previously use a different solution before we chose to work with Azure. 

How was the initial setup?

The installation process is not very straightforward. 

When you want to install with a higher level of security inside the infrastructure, nothing communicates. Therefore, engineering security and network engineers need to understand what they have to do exactly, and what the problem is. With Aure, there's a learning curve for installation. You need to work with it for at least one year before you get comfortable enough and are able to troubleshoot and configure everything relatively well.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The solution has the potential to be expensive if you as a company are not careful as to how you use it. 

What other advice do I have?

I'm a customer and an end-user.

I'd rate the solution at a ten out of ten. For me, it's a perfect product and I enjoy its capabilities. 

I would recommend this solution to other users and organizations. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

Public Cloud

If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?

Microsoft Azure
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Microsoft Azure Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: March 2024
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Microsoft Azure Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.