During my years at Nerdio, I have spoken to hundreds of customers. While many are primarily focused on cost savings (which Nerdio certainly provides!), these days it is much more about the value we offer to the business as a whole and the total ROI—the cherry on top, if you will.
1. Automation and repeatability
A key factor to keep in mind is the value that automation adds to your teams. Automated workflows ensure that tasks are completed accurately and consistently, minimizing the risk of human error. That is why automation is at the heart of Nerdio. It is what makes us stand out. Almost everything you can do within Nerdio is or can be automated. In other words, Nerdio’s automation capabilities are designed to simplify the complex and often cumbersome tasks associated with Microsoft Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) and Windows 365 (W365) management.
Offering customizable automation workflows tailored to the specific needs of an organization means that business processes are aligned with operational requirements, a crucial step in maintaining business continuity and ensuring IT services are always available and functioning optimally.
And when you think about it, automating repetitive tasks not only saves time but also cuts down on operational costs. With Nerdio, organizations can constantly monitor machine activity to automatically scale operations based on demand, not only starting and stopping machines but building them from scratch and removing them once they are no longer needed, ensuring you only pay for the resources you need.
By automating routine processes, such as on-demand desktop provisioning, desktop (image) management, and software deployment, Nerdio reduces the workload on IT teams, allowing them to focus on more strategic initiatives instead of putting out “fires” on a daily basis.
2. Dynamic scaling
Dynamic scaling is particularly beneficial for companies with fluctuating workloads, as it optimizes resource utilization and reduces waste—applicable to almost every company and vertical out there. Whether keeping an eye on CPU, RAM, average active session, auto-remediation performance, and more, Nerdio will monitor what is going on and take proper action depending on your needs. The same holds true for storage—attached disks, Azure Files, your Log Analytic Workspaces, etc., all of it can be automatically scaled and further fine-tuned.
This flexibility ensures that businesses can handle varying workloads without over or under-provisioning resources. In times of increased demand or unexpected spikes, Nerdio automatically allocates additional resources to maintain performance and availability. Nerdio will come up with continuous recommendations as well, bringing costs down even further and optimizing the user experience.
3. Proof of business value
Creating an entire AVD environment from scratch, including x number of machines (per host pool) can be tedious and clunky. With Nerdio, you can provision multiple host pools and machines that are ready for users within 1-2 hours. This will include your own image(s), applications, FSLogix, auto-heal functionality, logic for ongoing scaling, management, and more.
This mechanism is what we use when a customer wants to start a Proof of Value as well—it doesn’t get much easier! At a later stage, when new use cases (HR, design department, sales, etc.) arise, those can be handled in the exact same way. Efficiency is key here.
The above can be combined with our scaling profiles to take it a step further. A scaling profile holds preconfigured scaling logic that can be applied to an existing host pool or a newly built one, re-configured, or cloned at any time. Now, it is simply a matter of creating one or multiple host pools, which takes about 15 seconds per host pool. Just apply a pre-created auto-scale profile, click save and close. Have lunch, get some coffee, and voila, you are good to go.
If you need an alternative auto-scale configuration for part of the same host pool during certain periods of the year (the summer season or the winter holidays, for example) a specific date (bank holidays), a day, or a date range? No problem. Maybe you will need fewer machines, or you want to be a bit more or less aggressive when it comes to how and when machines are shut down or removed? That is all built-in as well and can be combined with the auto-scale profiles mentioned above. Regardless of your specific needs, Nerdio has you covered when it comes to proof of value.
4. Business continuity
Imagine it’s Monday morning and your employees are logging in to start their workday, whether from the office or home. Suddenly, nothing happens. The system is down, and productivity comes to a halt. In such situations, the first step is to identify the cause of the issue, which could range from a resource shortage in an Azure datacenter to a complete regional outage. However, knowing the cause doesn’t resolve the immediate problem—your employees are left unable to work, and your business grinds to a standstill.
The reality is that unexpected outages and disruptions can have severe consequences for any business. Prolonged downtime can lead to lost revenue, decreased customer satisfaction, and a tarnished reputation. Therefore, ensuring business continuity is crucial, and many organizations struggle to maintain operations during such crises due to the complexity and resource constraints involved.
Nerdio can alleviate these pain points with several proactive measures to ensure your business remains operational during unexpected events:
- Automated regular critical data and system backups: In the event of data loss caused by hardware failures, human errors, or cyber attacks, organizations can quickly restore their data from secure backup points. This automation removes the manual burden on IT teams and ensures consistent and reliable backups, reducing the risk of data loss.
- Disaster recovery as a service (DRaaS): By replicating data and systems to an alternative region, Nerdio enables businesses to swiftly switch to backup systems if the primary systems fail. This rapid failover capability minimizes downtime and ensures that business processes continue with minimal disruption.
- Specified alternative VM sizes and types: In case of resource shortages in an Azure region, Nerdio offers the flexibility to help overcome Azure compute capacity limits by providing multiple fallback VM sizes. As a result, operations such as host creation, auto-scale, auto-grow, and auto-heal can continue seamlessly, even if the preferred VM size in the region is unavailable.
Beyond these features, Nerdio offers comprehensive data and threat detection and protection measures. These automated security solutions ensure that your business is protected against a wide range of threats, further contributing to uninterrupted operations.
5. Updates and patching
One of the biggest challenges organizations face is keeping their systems up-to-date with the latest security and software updates. I think we are all familiar with Patch Tuesday–the unofficial term to refer to the day when Microsoft releases software updates. Despite its importance, manually patching and updating each virtual machine, testing each application for compatibility, deploying these updates across multiple host pools, and ensuring everything works well can be daunting, labor-intensive, and prone to human error. Many IT departments struggle with the complexity and time commitment required, leading to outdated systems vulnerable to security threats.
This is where Nerdio comes in. Nerdio automates the entire patching and update process from start to finish, significantly reducing the manual effort and time involved. For instance, you can set up recurring schedules within Nerdio to automatically apply updates a specific number of days after Patch Tuesday. Nerdio will update your chosen image with the latest patches, handle the sysprepping process, and hide all the complexity from the administrator.
Once the image is updated, you can select a host pool to test the updates, ensuring all applications function correctly and there are no driver or performance issues. Nerdio then re-images the AVD hosts using the same scheduling mechanism, either one by one or in bulk.
Nerdio also takes care of backing up critical components and integrates with the Azure Compute Gallery. Rolling back to a previous version is always an option, ensuring you have a safety net. Once testing confirms everything works as expected, you can roll out the updated image to your production host pools using the same automated mechanisms.
This streamlined process means that even those new to the system can set up the automation in just a few minutes, drastically reducing the time and effort typically required for patching and updates.
Cost savings
What about those cost savings? Isn’t that what you are known for? Absolutely, Nerdio continues to deliver substantial cost savings, optimizing resource consumption to save 50-70% on Azure resources, such as compute and storage. However, when you compare these savings to the importance of maintaining business continuity and ensuring seamless operations during critical scenarios, it’s clear that is not the only standout benefit.
Fortunately, with Nerdio, you don’t have to choose. You get enhanced business value through reliable and automated processes, uninterrupted operations, and significant cost savings. It’s the complete package, ensuring your business remains resilient and efficient.
Ready to learn more? Check out the Nerdio Manager for Enterprise page to see how you can add value beyond cost savings to your organization.
