Distributors Pax8 and D&H have added Microsoft Azure and Windows Virtual Desktop (WVD) solutions from Nerdio to their cloud service offerings.
The dual alliance agreements, which were announced alongside complementary pacts by D&H with cloud management vendor CloudCheckr and cloud management, migration, and assessment service provider ReadyNetworks, are designed to help MSPs capitalize on exploding adoption of Microsoft’s public cloud portfolio.
“For someone who doesn’t know Azure, this is like the Azure easy button,” says Ryan Burton, vice president of product strategy at Pax8. “You don’t have to hire really expensive resources to figure it out.”
Figuring out Azure, a complex environment with many components and options, can in fact be a challenge for many MSPs, according to Burton. “When an MSP starts looking at Azure and digs into it, they get lost very quickly,” he says, adding that Nerdio’s built-in “wizard-like” deployment tools shield users from that complexity.
“A partner does not have to go into Azure and do all of the networking and everything,” Burton observes. Nerdio’s platform is also flexible enough to help MSPs support both 100% online and hybrid cloud architectures, he continues, and then administer them after deployment.
“You can manage users, reset passwords, turn on and off machines, and manage the profiles of the individual users,” Burton says.
You can also draw on Nerdio’s automated scaling functionality to optimize Azure usage, according to Pax8 Chief Channel Officer Ryan Walsh. “They have the ability to turn on and off machines based on policy,” he says of Nerdio.
Despite its dynamic consumption capabilities, Burton says, Nerdio’s per-account and per-device subscription plans let MSPs build predictable margins into flat-rate prices that are equally predictable for end users. “Customers don’t want to buy a use-based product. They want to buy something that’s very standard every single month,” Burton notes.
Pax8 further simplifies billing for channel pros, he continues, by automatically pulling together consolidated, comprehensive Azure usage information.†
“You can really break it down and get very detailed if you want to, but also simplify the billing to roll up resource groups and make it very easy to understand how much storage, CPU, [and] RAM you’re using on a single customer,” Burton says. “We can also take the same usage from Nerdio on top of the Azure bill, so that one customer has all of their Azure consumption and the Nerdio consumption that matches on the same invoice on that same customer.” Integrations with leading PSA applications then automatically upload invoices to the platform MSPs use to manage finances.
Pax8’s Nerdio alliance reaches market just days after Microsoft reported 59% year-over-year growth in Azure revenue during the first quarter of its current fiscal year, and weeks after Microsoft officially made its Windows Virtual Desktop solution generally available. Nerdio’s streamlined WVD quoting, pricing, deployment, and management functionality played a significant role in Pax8’s decision to distribute that system.
“We’ve been tracking desktop as a service for a while,” Walsh says. “Nerdio’s alignment and support for Windows Virtual Desktop is a huge driver to this opportunity for us.”†
Indeed, a Pax8 employee with extensive Azure experience who normally requires 28 hours to rollout a WVD environment manually found that he could complete the same task in just two hours using Nerdio, according to Burton. “That’s the type of value proposition that’s going to get somebody’s attention,” he says.
Pax8 will advise its partners to seize the opportunity presented by the impending end of support for Windows 7 and Exchange Server 2010 to move on-premises workloads into Microsoft Azure, WVD, and the SMB-oriented Business edition of the Microsoft 365 productivity, security, and management suite.
“The timing can’t be better,” Burton says. “You’ve got to make the move anyways. The best way to do it is move to Microsoft 365 Business, and now you can even deploy it in a Windows Virtual Desktop.”
According to Nerdio, Pax8 shares its vision for cloud computing in the managed services channel. “Pax8 is a company that is totally focused on enabling MSPs to move to and be successful in the cloud,” says Joseph Landes, the company’s chief revenue officer. “Nerdio partnering with Pax8 is a natural fit, as our mission is to enable MSPs to build successful cloud practices in Microsoft Azure.”
In September, Pax8 announced a separate WVD-related alliance with CloudJumper. According to Walsh, adding Nerdio to the company’s line card gives partners a second option to evaluate. “They have different viewpoints on a similar area of opportunity,” he says. “I think it helps everybody.”
D&H sees promise in Nerdio as a vehicle for promoting Azure adoption as well. Bundling Nerdio solutions with services from CloudCheckr, meanwhile, allows MSPs to not only deploy and manage Azure workloads but cost optimize them as well.
“We’re excited to add CloudCheckr and Nerdio’s solutions as a key part of our Microsoft Azure Cloud Cluster strategy. Cloud Checkr allows VARs and MSPs to meter Azure consumption, and provide consultative services to help their SMB clients right-size and optimize their Azure environment based on utilization,” said Jason Bystrak, vice president of D&H’s cloud business unit, in a media statement. “Nerdio’s Definitive Azure Deployment Solution empowers MSPs to accelerate their cloud practices through a simple, streamlined process.”
The all-new cloud marketplace that D&H rolled out in June is designed to make selling cloud offerings in bundles easier.
“The transition to the cloud is no longer just an optional strategy for solution providers in the field. Digital transformation is making it a necessity for many solution providers to do business in the cloud, and they’re looking for the right partners to help them make a seamless migration to an MSP model,” said Nerdio’s Landes in prepared remarks. “We can deliver the technology to assist D&H’s MSP and reseller partners as they build business in the cloud, making the transformation as friction-free and rapid as possible, helping these MSPs reap the benefits of cloud services through new recurring revenue streams.”
Partnering with ReadyNetworks, a global cloud MSP with extensive Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, and Google experience, lets D&H offer its resellers the option of outsourcing assessment, migration, and management of Azure infrastructures to an experienced third party.
Nerdio announced an earlier distribution agreement with Ingram Micro in September.
