HyperGrid Integrates Advanced Microsoft Azure Capabilities Into Cloud Management Platform

The startup has tapped Microsoft Azure APIs to help newly certified Azure Expert MSPs improve governance, security, on-boarding, billing and management of the customer’s entire life cycle.

HyperGrid Thursday introduced an update to its cloud management platform geared to help Microsoft-aligned MSPs better secure Azure cloud infrastructure and manage the entire life cycle of their customer accounts.

The startup, based in Mountain View, Calif., worked with Microsoft to integrate into the latest version of its multi-cloud platform Azure APIs that lend partners greater control of on-boarding, governance, billing, anomaly detection and cost optimization, HyperGrid CEO Manoj Nair told CRN.

Those capabilities aim to benefit MSPs that have become certified through the Azure Expert MSP program introduced last summer. HyperGrid recently satisfied all of Microsoft's requirements for a cloud management platform compliant with the program.

[Related: Managing Multiple Clouds Still Challenged By Lack Of Comprehensive Management Platforms]

The Azure Expert MSP accreditation, available to Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) partners, drove Microsoft partners to HyperGrid's door.

Once the program was introduced, "we started getting interest, globally, from some pretty large Microsoft MSPs looking for cloud management platforms," Nair told CRN.

While HyperGrid's platform also is a popular choice among Amazon Web Services services providers, the interest from Microsoft’s channel motivated the company to work with Microsoft and dedicate itself to a major effort to deeply integrate advanced Azure capabilities, he said.

"We try to be that ISV in the middle," Nair said, between Microsoft's cloud services and MSPs.

The Azure capabilities, available in the 6.2 release of the HyperGrid platform, allow MSPs to on-board customers, manage their entire life cycles, set budgets and conduct billing. They can also improve governance and security, including by using anomaly detection features that flag unexpected usage of specific Microsoft services.

HyperGrid started out as a hyper-converged infrastructure developer called Gridstore, but changed its name, and later its course, after its 2016 acquisition of management platform developer DCHQ.

The startup eventually decoupled software and hardware and pivoted to focus on the cloud management technology, which has driven a surge of business and landed HyperGrid on the latest Gartner Magic Quadrant for that category.

"HyperGrid’s strong integration with Microsoft Azure CSP APIs allows CSPs to accelerate their ability to deliver value-added services for governance and cost control," said Jeana Jorgensen, Microsoft's general manager for cloud commercial communities, in a statement to CRN.

"Businesses migrating to the cloud seek confidence that their chosen partners have based their solutions and services on a fully vetted and compliant cloud management platform," she said.