Grasping the VDI Opportunity in a Remote Working World

For many organisations, 2020 will be remembered as the year that sparked the working-from-home revolution. What was once an option quickly became a global imperative that put IT professionals under pressure to deliver data and application scalability, availability and security.

It should then come as no surprise to see demand surge for virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), which over the past few months has served as a lifeline for many businesses.

The VDI market is forecast to reach US$25 million by 2025 according to Market Research Future. This represents a huge opportunity for channel partners to help their customers, particularly in the SMB space, to deliver service-driven solutions that account for a distributed working environment.

The advantages of VDI are plentiful: cost efficiencies from bypassing major hardware investments and maintenance; instant and seamless backup capabilities; high performance and productivity gains; centralised security and simplified management, to name a few.

But perhaps what’s most impressive about VDI is its ability to deliver on these advantages all the while supporting an outstanding user experience, whether in the office or remotely.

Figures from Gartner confirm that remote work is emerging as a new norm, with 88% of organisations encouraging or requiring employees to work from home. Another Gartner survey shows a quarter of 317 CFO respondents plan to move at least 20% of their onsite employees to remote work permanently.

For channel partners looking to create a competitive edge, VDI offers a wealth of opportunity, especially in the SMB market where VDI is ideally placed to make inroads.

According to IDC’s report, Implications of Microsoft Release of Windows Virtual Desktop, “Windows Virtual Desktop represents an opportunity for IT executives to recalibrate their end-user computing approach to account for the modern business environment.”

As a Microsoft distributor, Arrow is a big champion for Windows Virtual Desktop. This virtual desktop solution boasts a simplified licensing model; enables multiple users; and offers optimisations for Microsoft 365 Business Premium (and above) to support Remote Desktop Services (RDS) environments.

Given today’s modern business environment is one of mobile and remote working, Arrow has developed four Windows Virtual Desktop solution plans – Light, Medium, Heavy and Power – to suit the varying capacity requirements of different end users. The solutions are easy and quick to deploy and are available with add-on services such as assessment and migration services and Arrow calling plans for Teams.

These solutions are designed to enable Microsoft partners to easily and quickly deploy Windows Virtual Desktop and to maximise the growing market opportunity for VDI.

Contact your local Arrow representative for more information or visit Arrow's website to find out more.