Microsoft is flexing their philanthropic muscles with their latest offering, giving eligible Not for Profits access to their Azure cloud at no cost.
In a move that is going to shake up the Non-Profit sector Microsoft has announced that they are now offering $5000(USD) annual credits to eligible organisations.
What is Microsoft Azure?
"Azure is a cloud-based computing platform it’s purpose is to build, deploy and manage applications through a series of Microsoft managed data centres." –
It sounds very impressive, but what does it actually mean?
Traditionally organisations with multiple users would need to purchase expensive on-premises servers to grant their staff access to local networks, shared documents and software. There are inherent complications associated with servers like this, they are bulky, consume a lot of power and are incredibly expensive both to install and to maintain.
This is where Azure changes the game, think of it as your server but in the cloud.
With your organisation's information stored remotely there are some distinct advantages; security, scalability, flexibility and cost.
An organisation that implements Azure only pay for what it uses. Think of it like a utility bill, with on-site fixed servers you are paying for space that your organisation will never use. Like an electricity bill your organisation only pays for the amount of data and integrated software that you are accessing and with the latest offer for Microsoft, your organisation might not be paying anything at all. With this particular structure if your organisation grows or shrinks Azure can manage this change with no disruption to your service.
What you can get :
- Web and mobile apps
- Business apps
- Microservice apps
- Development and testing
- Big data and analytics
- Backup, recovery and archive
- High performance computing
- Digital media
- Internet of Things
An example that highlights the effectiveness of Azure, directly from Microsoft - "Partners In Health (PIH) is using Azure and other cloud solutions to improve its delivery of critical health services around the world. By moving their servers to the cloud, PIH was able to save $250,000 in IT costs because they no longer need to maintain their own servers. And every dollar saved on IT is another dollar that can more directly serve those in need.”