Key Benefits of Azure Virtual Desktop for Businesses

10 January 2023

Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop offers businesses a powerful and efficient way to access their applications and data with the convenience of a cloud platform. With Azure Virtual Desktop, users can access applications and data from anywhere and on any device. This helps businesses to increase productivity and decrease costs, while staying secure and compliant with industry regulations.

Azure Virtual Desktop provides a range of key benefits that can help businesses to unlock their potential and gain a competitive edge in the market. It offers enhanced scalability and flexibility, while also providing users with a secure and reliable environment to access their applications and data.

In addition, Azure Virtual Desktop also helps businesses to reduce costs by enabling them to pay for only the resources they need. This makes it an attractive option for businesses looking for an efficient and cost-effective way to access their applications and data.

What is Azure Virtual Desktop?

Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) is a powerful solution that allows organizations to give their users access to applications and data through the convenience of their own devices, such as laptops and desktop computers.

VDI is highly scalable and efficient, as it uses a centralized architecture that allows you to share resources, such as processing power, memory, and storage across a large number of users. This allows you to save costs and provides a secure environment for accessing applications and data.

Azure Virtual Desktop is a VDI solution that uses Azure for hosting the virtual machines. It allows users to access their applications and data from anywhere and on any device. You can also use it for collaboration sessions, such as providing your customers a shared screen for demonstrating products or services.

Benefits of Azure Virtual Desktop

There are many benefits associated with Azure Virtual Desktop, including enhanced scalability and flexibility, a secure and reliable environment, reduced costs, easy deployment and management, increased productivity, and compliance with industry regulations. Let’s take a closer look at these benefits in more detail.

Enhanced scalability and flexibility

Azure Virtual Desktop provides organizations with an efficient way to manage their resources, as they can easily expand or contract the number of machines on the fly to meet their needs. This allows them to scale up or down based on their requirements, while also increasing the availability of resources when needed.

Secure and reliable environment

Azure Virtual Desktop offers a secure and compliant environment, where users can access their applications and data. It uses modern security protocols, such as TLS and AES 256 encryption, to safeguard data and communications. In addition, it also complies with industry regulations, such as PCI DSS, GDPR, HIPAA, SOX, and FISMA.

Reduced costs

Azure Virtual Desktop benefits businesses an effective way to reduce costs, as they only pay for the resources that they need. This makes it an attractive option for organizations that are looking for a cost-effective solution for accessing their applications and data.

Increased productivity

AVD provides a seamless and reliable way to access applications and data from anywhere and on any device. This enables users to be more productive, as they can now work from anywhere with the same ease as if they were sitting at their desk. This in turn helps businesses to increase productivity and drive positive results.

Compliance with industry regulations

Azure Virtual Desktop offers a way to ensure that your business remains compliant with industry regulations. For example, organizations can use it to host regulated applications and data, such as Human Resources and Finance applications, on a secure cloud platform.

Azure Virtual Desktop Services

With Azure Virtual Desktop, you can use different services, including App Service, Virtual Machines, and Virtual Networks. Each of these services provides specific functionality, with certain limitations, to enable you to easily create an efficient and cost-effective VDI solution. Let’s take a closer look at each of these services.

App Service

With App Service, you can create a VDI application, with a single click, in the Azure portal. It allows you to create a single application that can be accessed from multiple devices, including PCs, Macs, Linux machines, and mobile devices. This helps you to reduce the time and effort associated with creating multiple VDI applications for each device type. You can also use App Service to create a secure and scalable application, with multi-tenancy, to host your line-of-business applications. It provides you with the flexibility to host multiple applications on one virtual machine, which enables you to reduce costs associated with a VDI architecture.

Virtual Machines

Another benefits of AVD is Virtual Machines, its a core part of Azure Virtual Desktop, as it hosts the virtual machines used by the users. With Virtual Machines, you can choose between two deployment models: Azure Hybrid Connect and Azure Virtual Network.

Secure Hybrid Connection

Azure Hybrid Connect helps you to create a secure hybrid connection between your on-premises computers and Azure VMs. It offers a secure connection that is managed by the customer, while using Azure as the underlying infrastructure. This model uses Hybrid Connect VPN appliances, which are managed and maintained by the customer.

Azure Virtual Network

It is an extension of your network, enabling you to extend your network boundary to include Azure VMs, thereby enabling seamless and secure access to your applications and data. It enables you to use your existing network security, connectivity, and identity services, such as VPNs, Security Groups, and DNS, to secure the Azure VMs.

Easy to Deploy and Manage

Azure Virtual Desktop offers easy deployment and management, as it does not require you to manage the infrastructure, such as networking, upgrading the system, and installing software. This allows you to get your VDI solution up and running in a matter of minutes. Moreover, you do not need specialized skills to manage it. Azure Virtual Desktop provides you with a centralized management portal to manage your VDI environment. This portal allows you to manage your VDI environment, such as creating new users, adding or removing applications, and configuring security.

Azure Virtual Desktop How to Get Started

The process of getting started with Azure Virtual Desktop is simple, as it involves a few simple steps. First, you need to sign up for a free trial, which allows you to experience the benefits of Azure Virtual Desktop and decide if it is right for your business.

Next, you need to create a Virtual Network and select your hypervisor. A virtual network is a logical network that connects your VMs with each other, while a hypervisor is the software that hosts VMs. The last step is to create VM templates and start creating users. You can further enhance your VDI solution by adding optional features, such as Azure Active Directory, which allows you to manage your users and applications from a single location.