We know how important Research is at your University and that sometimes it can take time to deploy the storage and compute capabilities required to process large amounts of research data. This is why CoreAzure is working alongside Microsoft to bring you our Research as a Service (RaaS) offering for UK Universities. In conjunction with Kings College London and University of Nottingham, we have developed a low-cost solution to provide academics with a cloud-based Research as a Service environment.
Researchers and IT departments told us they wanted an environment that;
- Could be provisioned in minutes and hours, not days
- Was secure enough to host health-related data and other highly sensitive data assets
- Had cost transparency
- Had secure data import / export capabilities
- Could accommodate Azure IaaS, PaaS, SaaS and 3rd party research toolsets
- Could extend existing research/HPC workloads
- Ensured data never leaves the research environment
- Was securely accessible via any device globally
Solution overview
CoreAzure has developed a fully automated RaaS/Data Safe Haven solution which allows researchers and IT departments to easily manage and to deploy many differing research projects with minimal overheads, providing a great user experience. The solution is based on the Azure blueprints published by Microsoft and NHS digital which stipulate the overall architecture and security controls that need to be put in place.
We created and deployed a RaaS environment with the following characteristics;
- Easy to manage and deploy. Fully automated using IaaC and DevOps
- Quick to build components common to multiple research projects
- Quick to establish environments or Data Safe Havens needed to facilitate the management and analysis of data in support of academic research project
- A segregated environment that can safely host sensitive data assets
- Access a range of native Azure research capabilities including big data, IOT solutions, or open source machine learning
It's different from traditional High Performance Compute (HPC) approaches:
• RaaS complements existing on-premise HPC capabilities by providing environments that can be established and scaled instantaneously
• Central IT functions work with CoreAzure to build the RaaS capability in line with corporate information security standards and compliance frameworks RaaS Solution RaaS characteristics Compared to traditional HPC approaches
• RaaS provides real time data on consumption costs and usage, which can be attributed to specific research projects and related activities. Anticipated costs to conduct research can also be quickly estimated and used when applying for research grants.
Contact CoreAzure today to see how we can help your institution establish a research capability in Azure.