Our thoughts on the future of digital innovation and the cloud.

Microsoft makes a significant announcement in the Canadian Cloud market and it really will fuel innovation (and keep data) in Canada.

On January 9th, 2020 Microsoft made what is arguably it’s biggest announcement (in terms of impact to business growth and digital transformation in Canada) since 2016. At its Envision event in Toronto, Microsoft announced it’s first Canadian Azure Availability Zone and a new Azure ExpressRoute destined for Vancouver. These two significant investments will keep Microsoft ahead of their competitors in Canada and help Gold Microsoft partners like Invero thrive as businesses transform themselves in the digital age.

Microsoft Makes Significant Investments in Canadian Cloud

Microsoft announces Canadian Azure Availability Zone, and Azure ExpressRoute in Vancouver

Reason 1: Canadian Azure Availability Zone Announced

Availability Zones give users high availability for their most demanding applications and services as well as confidence and protection from potential hardware and software failures by providing three or more unique physical locations within an Azure region. According to Microsoft, the opening of the zone will be the largest increase in compute capacity since 2016, at 1,300 per cent!

Azure will be the only hyperscale cloud platform in Canada to offer Availability Zones and disaster recovery with in-country data residency. The most important piece of this for many Canadian businesses and public sector organizations is Microsoft’s promise to maintain data residency. All data will stay in Canada with compliance certifications including the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act and Protected B data in Canada.

“Microsoft cloud services have been a core component to the growth and development of thousands of Canadian organizations, and we continue to make significant investments in both cloud solutions and skilling programs to ensure that all of our customers, whether private or public sector, startup or enterprise, are able to accelerate their digital transformation,” said Kevin Peesker, President of Microsoft Canada. “The launch of Azure Availability Zones take Azure to a new level in Canada by offering customers increased reliability, performance and business continuity so they can thrive in the digital age.”

Reason 2. A New Azure ExpressRoute in Vancouver

Set to go live in March 2020, organizations working out of Vancouver will have a local, secure ExpressRoute connection to Azure. Already existing in Toronto, Montreal and Quebec City, Vancouver businesses will be able to have a secure network connection with much lower latency into Azure without having to connect east or south to the United States.

ExpressRoute connections do not go over the public internet, and offer more reliability, faster speeds and lower latency than typical internet connections.

For more information about what you can do to leverage the power of Microsoft Azure in your business, contact Invero here. We are a Microsoft Gold Partner and winner of the 2019 Cloud Summit Microsoft Azure Partner of the Year.