Migrating Files to Azure Easier

By Jurgen Willis,VP, Azure optimized workloads and storage, Microsoft Azure

We listen to our customers and then building products and partnerships that meet customer needs and enable every application to migrate to Azure.

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We recognize that migrating virtual desktop, virtual server, high performance compute, analytics, and many other critical applications requires copying tens of terabytes to several petabytes of file data stored on file servers, NAS appliances, and Object Storage to Azure. Automated, intuitive, and scalable solutions are required to migrate file data between heterogeneous platforms and eliminate the inherent complexity and risk of these projects. Our customers have told us that copying unstructured and semi-structured file data to Azure Blob Storage, Azure Files, and Azure NetApp Files needs to be fast and easy so you can focus on innovating with Azure services.

We are announcing the Azure File Migration Program which gives customers and partners in our solution integrator and service provider ecosystem, access to industry-leading file migration solutions from Komprise and Data Dynamics – at no cost. These solutions help easily, safely, and securely migrate file and object data to Azure Storage.

Azure Migrate offers a set of no-cost (or low-cost) tools to help you migrate virtual machines, websites, databases, and virtual desktops for critical applications. You can modernize legacy applications by migrating them from servers to containers and build a cloud native environment. Our new program complements Azure Migrate and provides the means to migrate applications and workloads that include large volumes of unstructured file data.

This program offers free software licensing, an onboarding session, and access to the migration solution provider’s support organization. You can review a detailed comparison of the solutions, review the Getting Started Guides for Data Dynamics and Komprise, and watch videos showcasing their functionality. After choosing the solution that best fits your needs, you select the appropriate Azure sponsored offer from the Azure Marketplace.

We plan to expand this program going forward to include additional migration ISVs and target storage platforms to support any and every storage migration scenario – subscribe to this blog for updates as we expand the program.

To learn more about this program, visit our Tech Community Blog where Karl Rautenstrauch, principal program manager, has written a post to help you move forward and take advantage of this offer. You can also learn more about migrating application workloads to Azure by visiting the Azure Migration and Modernization Center.