Modernize for AI: How Azure Local Powers Your Data Center Refresh

As organizations expand their use of artificial intelligence, they’re also rethinking how and where to run those operations, especially when a data center refresh is on the horizon. For those in regulated industries, such as healthcare and financial services, keeping data onsite can be a requirement. Microsoft Azure Local lets organizations run AI workloads securely on-premises while benefiting from centralized cloud management and simplified operations.

Azure Local is built on hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI), which bundles compute, networking and storage into a single platform to simplify management and control costs. Azure Arc, the bridge between the cloud and on-premises infrastructure, enables unified governance and security, along with a more agile approach to shifting workloads between the cloud and the data center. From my perspective, seamless interoperability is one of the most significant benefits that Azure Local delivers.

Extending Azure Local on-premises creates a hybrid foundation for AI with better performance and secure data locality. CDW refreshed its data center with Azure Local, migrating all nonproduction workloads in four months. CDW uses this solution to support broader objectives for efficient workload hosting and the benefits of hyperconvergence and hybrid cloud.

The ability to run AI and other workloads on-premises — and to speed them up with AMD/Intel acceleration — is becoming essential. In healthcare, for example, organizations must retain patient data on-premises, and clinicians need fast access to that data to make informed decisions. Azure Local meets both needs by supporting low-latency AI applications on-premises without sacrificing the convenience of cloud-based management.

Government agencies and organizations with sensitive intellectual property may need even tighter controls over data operations. They may choose (or be required) to maintain sovereign operations within a specific country, or disconnected operations cut off from the internet entirely. Azure Local provides the flexibility to run these workloads on-premises while retaining the ability to connect to Azure when appropriate.

Organizations should also consider Azure Local as part of SQL Server upgrades. On-premises environments using legacy operating systems need platforms that can support scale and modernization, including AI applications. Pairing a SQL Server refresh with Azure Local provides that foundation, along with predictable costs and cloud-based management.

In addition to enabling on-premises AI operations, Azure Local helps address challenges that can arise during a data center refresh. Virtualization — running multiple virtual servers on a single physical server — can be costly and complex to maintain. Azure Local simplifies this by providing a virtualization layer built on HCI. Azure Local also enhances virtual desktop infrastructure, which organizations often modernize during data center upgrades. Running VDI (Azure Virtual Desktop) on Azure Local delivers better performance and reduced latency.

Using Azure Local to establish a hybrid, AI-ready infrastructure has strategic benefits for IT departments. Centralized management through Azure lets staffers secure and manage infrastructure and workloads from a single platform using familiar tools, which helps to maintain consistency across environments. Azure Local also supports cost optimization through monthly, per-core pricing, without requiring significant hardware expenditures. Finally, Azure Local positions the data center for future success with AI, VDI and modern applications.

With its Azure experts, CDW can be a strategic partner for organizations planning a data center refresh or building a future roadmap. Through partnerships with Dell, HPE, Intel and AMD, CDW can take a brand-agnostic approach to architecture design, tailoring the deployment to a specific environment, performance objectives and compliance needs. We can also assess existing environments, manage proof-of-concept deployments and support migrations.