SUSE Deepens Azure Cloud Integrations for Business Customers

Two new Microsoft Azure cloud integrations aim to help SUSE customers simplify their IT infrastructures.

SUSE unveiled the integrations at its SUSEcon Digital ’20 event, where SUSE is holding a range of sessions. The company originally scheduled SUSEcon for March in Dublin, but changed it to a virtual event due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The first integration finds SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES) and SUSE CaaS Platform now supported by Microsoft Azure Arc for servers. Azure Arc is designed to extend Azure management to servers and Kubernetes clusters. It also enables the deployment of Azure data services anywhere, from on premises to multicloud. In addition, it provides a central management control plane with security and governance for SLES systems hosted in non-Azure clouds. That includes edge deployments.

In another integration, SUSE Cloud Application Platform is now available for Azure through a bring-your-own-subscription basis in the Azure Marketplace. This release simplifies users’ deployment of SUSE Cloud Application Platform into Azure Kubernetes Service. That includes the availability of new Terraform scripts to set up Kubernetes clusters quickly. An Open Service Broker API lets users take advantage of the entire Azure ecosystem to maximize their infrastructure investments.

Also announced in the Azure Cloud Integrations is the Azure Marketplace availability of SUSE Linux Enterprise High Performance Computing. The services are available as pay-as-you-go (PAYG) and bring-your-own-service offerings. SUSE Linux Enterprise HPC includes an Azure-tuned kernel specifically designed for faster throughput and reduced latency. This allows customers to speed up delivery and scalability of their applications natively or through cloud bursting. SUSE and Microsoft give customers integrated support for the products.

The Easy Button

The latest Azure integrations come after SUSE heard from tech leaders who said they need simpler technologies.

SUSE’s Thomas Di Giacomo

“We’ve been running a survey with CIOs and executives around the world,” Thomas Di Giacomo, SUSE’s president of engineering and innovation, told Channel Futures. “We found out they want to simplify their IT. Well, we are pretty good at delivering new technologies. More challenging is to remove old things when they have been running for many years.”

That’s where SUSE’s history of doing technology differently with partners like Microsoft, Dall and SAP is helpful, said Di Giacomo.

“It’s the whole ecosystem,” he said. “We are working to make things simpler for customers. That’s embedded in everything that SUSE is doing. We are taking those messages from the surveys.”

And with the COVID-19 pandemic affecting businesses around the world, the Azure cloud integrations are even more important, he said.

“Today during the challenging times we are all facing, it’s become even more relevant. Companies can only survive by simplifying technologies and processes. And we see open source software playing a key role there, and not just for cost savings. Open source is relevant today because it can bridge what you are running today to new technologies in the future. You can integrate and interface with virtually anything.”

SUSE and Microsoft have been partners since 2006.

“It was bit tricky at the time to be a Linux company and be a partner with Microsoft,” said Di Giacomo. “Since then we’ve done a lot of things with Azure to help people move to public cloud. Obviously with COVID-19, we are seeing that movement accelerate.”

Microsoft Azure Arc Integration

Di Giacomo said the new SUSE Azure Arc product covers any kinds of cloud infrastructure.

“SUSE and Azure customers can benefit from Arc irrespective of the cloud they are running in — private, public or hybrid,” he said. “It’s about managing the infrastructure itself. Arc and SLED and CaaS provide you with a single management dashboard, wherever the cloud sits.”

That makes things easier for customers who run systems both in public cloud and on remises, said Di Giacomo.

“Previously, you had to run on-premises and public cloud systems differently and separately,” he said.

This provides a single console view, as well as simpler cloud migrations from one place to another, he said.

SUSE Cloud Application Platform Integration

The SUSE Cloud Application Platform on Azure marketplace arrives as Kubernetes and container use increases, said Di Giacomo.

With this announcement, customers and channel partners remove Kubernetes complexity to make it easier to use, he said.

“And you get microservices … all connected and abstracting data so you just have to focus on your business applications,” said Di Giacomo.

The SUSEcon Digital ’20 virtual event also included other keynotes, training sessions and discussions with customers and partners.