HPE ProLiant for Microsoft Azure Stack hybrid cloud solution delivers azure-cosistent services from the local data center
Link Datacenter (LDC), Egypt’s largest managed-services provider, anticipates substantial growth as it embarks on its latest venture—meeting the growing demand for hybrid cloud environments. Many LDC customers are already leveraging the power of Microsoft Azure public cloud services but face data privacy and sovereignty constraints that require them to store certain types of data within country boundaries.
LDC worked with HPE to deploy the HPE ProLiant for Microsoft Azure Stack hybrid cloud solution in its data center, allowing the company’s customers to run a range of Azure-consistent customer applications that require an on-premises environment.
When selecting a partner to implement the solution, LDC’s CEO, Gamal Selim, considered other Microsoft Azure Stack vendors but says HPE was his first choice based on a 20-year relationship, as well as what he calls HPE’s comprehensive engagement model. HPE has helped LDC rightsize its solution and develop a pricing structure to optimize revenue.
HPE has the tools and benchmarks to help us understand how to price our offerings based on Azure Stack, and they were very insightful when it came to facilitating the decision-making process and even the financial process through their partners,” he says.
We are expecting 30% growth year-over-year, and even that may be conservative.
Gamal Selim, CEO
Link Datacenter
Data Compliance and Edge Computing
HPE ProLiant for Microsoft Azure Stack easily integrates with the Azure public cloud while delivering the security of an on-premises cloud. For example, Selim notes, his customers in the government and financial sectors can deploy applications in data centers around the world while keeping sensitive data within Egypt’s borders.
Additionally, because Azure public cloud and Azure Stack are API-compatible, developers can deploy workloads across both platforms without needing to change any code, and organizations can decide where each workload should reside based on cost‑efficiency and resource requirements.
LDC is enthusiastic about this flexibility. “We can cater to a lot of different workloads—we’ll have customers deploying outside the country, inside the country in our data center, and even in their own data centers,” explains Selim. “There are a lot of possibilities.”
The solution will also enable edge scenarios, allowing customers to process data near the edge while sending additional information to the LDC data center or public cloud. Selim also expects the solution to deliver improved application performance by reducing latency below 70 milliseconds, as customers can now deploy at LDC’s data center rather than connect to the nearest Microsoft Azure data center in Europe.
Increased Revenue Opportunities
LDC is projecting 30% year-over-year growth, and “even that may be conservative,” notes Selim.
In addition to attracting more government, financial, and large enterprise customers facing data sovereignty issues, LDC is in talks with independent software vendor (ISVs) who will purchase hosting for software-as-a-service (SaaS) models requiring the same in-country data compliance.
In the data center, we consume a lot of HPE products, and we trust the equipment. We know it works.
Gamal Selim, CEO
Link Datacenter
HPE ProLiant for Microsoft Azure Stack provides LDC opportunities to generate income with solution and service add-ons. “It’s like adding another dimension to the technologies we are already providing,” explains Selim. “We will consult with our customers, show them the opportunities they have now with this technology available in country, and then help them build out new applications more quickly.”