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HCL goes all in on Microsoft, launches dedicated business unit

Follows dedicated Google Cloud division launch in November 2019
Judson Althoff (Microsoft)

Judson Althoff (Microsoft)

HCL Technologies has launched a business unit dedicated to the delivery of Microsoft technologies, housing more than 5500 employees serving over 2000 customers.

Under the official banner of ‘HCL Microsoft Business Unit’, the division is designed to enhance expertise across Dynamics 365, Azure, Microsoft 365 and Windows 10 offerings, with specific focus on business applications, artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things (IoT).

The practice also integrates PowerObjects - a specialist Dynamics business acquired by HCL in October 2015 - with plans in place to create intellectual property through the Microsoft platform.

“The HCL Microsoft Business Unit is the next phase to bolster HCL’s successful and long-standing relationship with Microsoft,” said Kalyan Kumar, corporate vice president of HCL Technologies. “Increasingly, customers are making bold strides, incorporating IoT solutions with machine learning for analytics, running this solution in the public cloud and supported by CRM [customer relationship management].

“This business unit combines HCL’s specialised services and global reach with Microsoft’s powerful cloud and business technologies, making a strong and unique offering for clients. These offerings are coming at a critical time when enterprises are aggressively implementing digital technologies for competitive advantage.”

Leading the division is Seattle-based Don Jones, who brings more than 20 years of Microsoft experience to the role following executive positions at Microsoft, Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Capgemini.

“HCL is taking an important step forward in the long-standing partnership between our two companies,” added Judson Althoff, executive vice president of Microsoft. “As a result, companies will benefit from unique products and services tailored to their digital journey while fostering modern work and collaboration. Together, we will be able to offer our joint customers a rich experience.”

HCL - recognised as a Microsoft Azure Expert Managed Service Provider in January 2019 - also recently launched a dedicated Google Cloud division in November 2019 to drive cloud adoption at enterprise level, through a preferred partner agreement targeting specific vertical markets globally.

As reported by Channel Asia, the global system integrator currently has more than 1300 professionals trained on Google Cloud, with plans in place to reach 5000 specialists in the “near future”.

Backed by engineering, solutions and business team support from the vendor, HCL will target customers across key technologies such as containerisation, hybrid and multi-cloud through Anthos and compute, in addition to data and analytics, artificial intelligence, machine learning and G Suite collaboration.