Cloud Integration Solutions

Progent has assisted businesses of all types and sizes to design, implement, and manage information networks based on a variety of hybrid models that mix Azure cloud-based resources with physical facilities, private clouds, and other public clouds like Amazon AWS. Progent is unmatched in the ability to provide rapid and economical online access to IT consulting experts to assist you to understand the potential benefits of various Azure services for your particular business. Progent's virtualization consultants can help you to plan and configure VMs on Azure Virtual Machines. Progent's certified information security consultants can help you centralize identity management with Microsoft Entra ID (formerly called Azure Active Directory). Progent's data protection experts can assist you to deploy backup/recovery solutions with Azure Backup. In addition, Progent's VPN and security appliance specialists can show you how to set up secure and dependable connections to Azure.

About Microsoft Azure
Microsoft Azure, previously called Windows Azure, is a popular cloud service that allows you to utilize IT infrastructure, servers, and key application software residing on Microsoft's vast cloud. Microsoft Azure offers dozens of cloud-based services such as hosting Windows and Linux-based virtual machines (VMs), scalable cloud storage, unified messaging, development, and backup/restore. Microsoft Azure services are offered on a subscription basis and provided as-needed, so organizations can immediately scale up or ratchet down compute and storage resources. Because you pay only for the computer resources you need, efficiency is high, which is the key of cloud computing.

Key Microsoft Azure Cloud Products and Services
Microsoft Azure offers dozens of IaaS and platform options and hundreds of services. This expanding line of integrated cloud services addresses practically all areas of information technology such as compute, data and storage, network infrastructure, administration, security, web hosting, mobility, applications, and development. Other popular offerings like Office 365 Exchange depend Microsoft Azure cloud infrastructure. (See Microsoft Office 365 Exchange Online integration and troubleshooting consulting services.)

Key Azure products and services for which Progent can deliver high-level consulting expertise and technical support services include:

Azure Virtual Machines makes it easy for you to provision, scale and administer virtual machines on the Azure cloud. Your Azure Storage subscription provides storage for the OS disk and any data disks. Azure Virtual Machines works with Windows Server, major distros of Linux, IBM, Oracle Database, and other popular platforms. Various categories of virtual machines are available and priced based on CPU power, memory capacity, and I/O throughput. You can access Microsoft Azure VMs via Remote Desktop Connection (RDP). The Platform-as-a-Service features of Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines allows organizations to run Windows workloads like SQL Server, Exchange, and Microsoft Dynamics as well as major Linux distributions such as Red Hat, Debian, CoreOS, and RancherOS.

The enhanced deployment model for Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines, branded Azure Resource Manager, supersedes what is now called Azure Classic and offers streamlined virtual machine management by supporting VM groups with a shared lifecycle. Before, Azure services for deploying, scaling, and managing VMs had to be handled one VM at a time. Resource Manager deployment features include Azure Portal, Azure Resource Manager template, Azure PowerShell, and Visual Studio support. Progent's Azure specialists can show you how to create and administer Microsoft Azure environments efficiently and economically by delivering expertise with all these tools for managing Azure Virtual Machines.

Microsoft Azure Storage offers dynamic capacity and load balancing for primary storage hosted on the Azure cloud. A General Purpose Storage account provides Azure clients access to storage services for Blobs, Tables, Files, Queues, and virtual machine drives. Each account includes a 500 TB capacity maximum. For higher throughput, you can upgrade to a Premium storage tier and run virtual machine applications on solid state disks (SSDs).

Azure Blob storage for General Purpose Storage accounts is designed for large volumes of unstructured object data such as documents, social media, backups, web pages, log files and Big Data. Blobs are managed as containers, making it simpler to designate policies to object groups. To send blobs that are impractical to upload over an Internet connection, you can mail a drive to Microsoft.

A separate class of Blob Storage is designed for applications that only require block or append blob storage. You can designate Hot or Cool access characteristics for block and append blobs (but not for page blobs). The ability to classify data access characteristics in Microsoft Azure storage accounts enables you to establish the right trade-off between cost and performance.

Table storage is economical cloud storage intended for developers using NoSQL metadata such as address books, device information, or web apps. Azure Table Storage works with the OData protocol for advanced querying and supports JSON and XMLd AtomPub formats. Queue storage helps in the creation of messaging solutions by handling asynchronous exchanges between application components that span cloud and physical environments. Microsoft Azure File storage accommodates SMB file shares, which streamlines migrating older apps to Azure.

Microsoft Entra ID, previously branded Azure Active Directory, is a cloud-based directory and identity management service that provides password synchronization and single sign-on across local and cloud infrastructure. Microsoft Entra is incorporated in Microsoft 365, Salesforce.com, DropBox, Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online, and many other cloud applications. Capabilities include multi-factor authentication, device registration, password synchronization across cloud and local environments, privileged account management, granular role-based access control (RBAC), application usage monitoring, security monitoring, and alerts. Microsoft Azure Entra integrates seamlessly with your Windows Server AD to make it simple to unify local and cloud-based identities. Azure offers advanced reliability by storing your directories on a minimum of three separate facilities.

The Azure Entra Connect tool has superseded Windows Azure Active Directory Sync (DirSync), Azure AD Sync (AAD Sync) and Forefront Identity Manager as the recommended means to integrate on-premises directories and synchronize identity information with Active Directory, Office 365 and SaaS cloud applications.

Azure Backup is a managed backup service that simplifies offsite backup of local, cloud, and hybrid environments. Three copies of protected data are kept in the same Azure facility, and three extra copies can be housed at a geographically separate Azure location. Microsoft offers SLAs for 99.9% availability, and archiving in the Azure cloud can be up to 99 years. You can schedule backups for daily, monthly, weekly, and yearly periods, and recovery time is quicker and less expensive than old-school tape-based technology. Backups are encrypted prior to being sent across a protected connection to the Azure cloud, and backups are stored encrypted. The encryption key is stored and managed locally for enhanced compliance. Additional features include throttling to take advantage of low-traffic periods, compression to improve throughput and reduced storage costs, and incremental backups to conserve bandwidth. Azure Import/Export enables you to perform your initial backup on-premises and deliver a physical drive to the closest Azure facility.

Azure Backup integrates closely with System Center Data Protection Manager (SCDPM) to offer targeted support for Microsoft's mission-critical platforms like Exchange, SQL Server, SharePoint Server, and Hyper-V. SCDPM works transparently with Windows Hyper-V VSS to protect virtual machines without interrupting their operation. SCDPM also offers product-specific granular restore features such as mailbox recovery for Exchange, database-level restore for SQL Server, and Item Level Recovery for SharePoint Server. Azure Backup solutions integrated with Data Protection Manager can be monitored with SCOM to watch over system health, throughput, and efficiency.

How Progent Can Assist You with Microsoft Azure Solutions
If you want to move your network to the Microsoft Azure cloud or build a hybrid environment that integrates on-premises and Azure resources, Progent's consultants can help you evaluate the advantages of the Azure line of services vs. other public clouds or different architectural models like using colo centers. Progent can help your business with every phase of Microsoft Azure migration including benefits assessment, system design, proof of concept, implementation, unified management and monitoring, performance tuning, software license control, disaster recovery planning, security planning, and compliance analysis.

Progent can assist you to determine which of your mission-critical applications are appropriate for Azure and help you make your older applications are cloud ready. Progent can provide affordable on-demand support to help you immediately deal with stubborn technical hurdles or Progent can provide end-to-end project management outsourcing services to make sure your Microsoft Azure integration initiative is completed on schedule and on budget.

To help you implement centralized management of a hybrid cloud environment that incorporates Azure services, Progent can provide System Center consulting services including System Center Data Protection Manager (SCDPM) consulting, System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) support services, System Center Configuration Manager expertise, System Center Virtual Machine Manager hybrid cloud management consulting, and Microsoft Intune mobility management consulting.

Cloud-integrated solutions have to provide a safe, manageable, user-friendly, and reliable environment for user to connect to both on-premises cloud resources. Progent has a wealth of experience deploying IPsec VPN connections and setting up or troubleshooting firewalls to link to Azure services. Progent can provide fast remote access to Cisco-certified CCIE network integration consultants and to firewall experts certified by top suppliers like Symantec, Barracuda, and Check Point to help you to configure or troubleshoot firewalls for integrating your local network with Microsoft Azure. Progent also supports mobile users by offering the skills of iPhone and iPad technology consultants and Google Android connectivity experts to help you to configure and manage smartphones and tablets that utilize your Azure environment. When you encounter glitches with your Microsoft Azure solution, Progent has extensive experience working with Microsoft's technical personnel to resolve problems with Azure.

Typical samples of remote consulting services Progent has delivered to organizations to help them build and maintain their Azure-connected ecosystems include:

• Set up and troubleshoot IPsec VPN tunnels forsecure connectivity to Microsoft Azure
• Design or review the architecture of hybrid Azure/on-premises environments
• Put together VM images for Windows or Linux technology to be hosted on Azure
• Implement Microsoft Entra (Azure AD), Entra Connect (Azure AD Connect), and Federation Services
• Design and validate backup vaults that utilize Azure Backup
• Set up and troubleshoot virtual hard disks (VHDs) for Microsoft Azure
• Define and deploy policies
• Identify and resolve issues with IP addresses
• Fix synchronization issues associated with Office 365
• Set up, update, and troubleshoot firewalls from Cisco, Barracuda, SonicWall and other vendors
• Configure Cisco AnyConnect for accessing Azure products and services
• Streamline software license control
• Fix problems with certificates
• Select and configure unified management, monitoring and reporting utilities across hybrid networks
• Implement SCCM to deploy applications
• Install System Center Virtual Machine Manager locally and on Azure
• Design and configure hybrid Exchange deployments
• Tune query performance on SQL Server hosted by Microsoft Azure
• Migrate Citrix XenDesktop to Azure
• troubleshoot PowerShell problems for loading modules to Azure

Other Public Cloud Services Supported by Progent
Services offered on leading public clouds are growing quickly in volume and complexity. Selecting the right solution can be increasingly difficult. The majority of enterprises have hybrid networks that use more than one public cloud and at the same time maintain on-premises facilities. Office 365 line of applications, such as Exchange Online and Skype for Business Online, rely on Azure infrastructure and offer alternative paths to Azure's IaaS options. Progent can help your organization to evaluate the business advantages of the services offered by. many options available from the leading cloud vendors and show you how to design, integrate, and manage IT environments that include a variety of public and private clouds plus physical local facilities.

Additional public cloud platforms supported by Progent include:

Microsoft supports seamless hybrid networks that combine Microsoft 365 and local installations of Exchange. This allows you to have specific mailboxes hosted on your on-premises datacenter and other mailboxes resident on Microsoft 365. Progent's Microsoft-certified Exchange consulting team can help your organization with any phase of planning, implementing and debugging your hybrid Microsoft 365/Exchange solution. Progent's Exchange consultants can deliver as-needed expertise to help you resolve challenging technical problems and also can provide extensive project management outsourcing to make sure your hybrid Microsoft 365/Exchange solution is carried out on schedule and within budget. For more information about Progent's online consulting services for integrating Microsoft 365 Exchange and on-premises Exchange environments, visit Microsoft 365 Exchange Online integration with on-prem Exchange.

Progent's Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365 experts can help companies of any size to integrate Microsoft Office desktop and Microsoft 365 apps such as Excel, Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, Microsoft Access, Visio and Publisher into a cohesive productivity solution that offers quick ROI and promotes better business outcomes. Progent can help you to integrate Office or Microsoft 365 applications with one another and with other core Microsoft technologies such as SharePoint Server, Microsoft Exchange Server and Microsoft SQL Server running on-premises or hosted in the cloud. Progent's consultants can also help you to resolve compatibility issues between various releases of Office and offers live online Microsoft Office and Microsoft 365 training to individuals and teams.

Progent's Amazon Web Services (AWS) integration consultants can provide affordable remote consulting to help companies to access Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud services such as Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) for virtual server hosting, Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) for scalable high-performance storage, and Amazon Glacier for low-cost long-term archiving. Progent can assist you with every phase of Amazon AWS integration including needs analysis, readiness evaluation, architectural design, pilot testing, configuration, centralized administration, performance tuning, software license management, disaster recovery mechanisms, and security and compliance. Progent can provide advanced expertise with firewall configuration and VPN connections and can show you how to deploy cloud-based or hybrid environments that seamlessly incorporate Amazon AWS cloud services. Progent can provide as-needed expertise or Progent can deliver comprehensive project management outsourcing or co-sourcing services to help you move smoothly to the Amazon AWS cloud.

Amazon Marketplace Web Service (Amazon MWS) is an integrated library of APIs that allows Amazon sellers to improve the efficiency of their operations by automating crucial sales activities such as listings, orders, payments, fulfillment, and finances. By tapping into Amazon's vast online ecosystem and automating their sales, merchants can broaden their reach, lower their operating costs, improve reaction time to customers, and add to their bottom line. Progent's Amazon Marketplace Web Service (Amazon MWS) developers can collaborate with your development staff and provide application programming, workflow integration, project management support, and training so you can cut development time and costs and speed up your return on investment.

Progent's Google Cloud Platform planning and integration experts offer affordable online and on-premises consulting to help organizations to migrate all or part of their core network infrastructure to Google Cloud Platform (GCP). This can save management hassle and equipment expense and enable the use of Google's cutting edge AI and machine learning tools. Progent can help you with every aspect of Google Cloud Platform migration and troubleshooting including needs analysis, readiness evaluation, architectural design, testing, deployment, administration, performance tuning, licensing management, backup/restore mechanisms, and security and compliance.