Azure cloud engineering
Azure is the natural home for organisations already running Microsoft — identity, licensing and support all line up. For .NET estates and enterprises with Active Directory, it removes far more friction than it adds.
Where we use Azure
Azure is part of the stack on these 4 services. Each page covers how we work, what you get and what it costs to start.
Azure in practice
Azure’s decisive advantage is identity. Entra ID integration means single sign-on, conditional access and group-based permissions arrive without a custom authentication layer, and access to your application follows the same directory as access to everything else the organisation runs.
The commercial side matters as much as the technical one. Most large organisations already have an enterprise agreement, so using Azure is a line item rather than a procurement exercise. Combined with genuinely good hybrid support for estates that will keep part of their infrastructure on-premises, that is usually what settles the decision.
What we build with Azure
App Service and AKS deployments with autoscaling and deployment slots for zero-downtime releases.
Products authenticating against Entra ID, so access follows the corporate directory rather than a separate user list.
Azure SQL, storage and data services feeding reporting and BI layers.
Is Azure right for you?
Ask usA good fit when
- Organisations running Microsoft 365, Active Directory and .NET
- Applications that should authenticate against the corporate directory
- Hybrid estates keeping infrastructure on-premises
- Enterprises with an existing Azure agreement
Probably not when
- Startups with no Microsoft dependency
- Teams whose experience is entirely AWS
- Workloads clearly better priced elsewhere
What we run alongside Azure
The rest of the setup, and why each piece is there. We keep this list short on purpose — every dependency is something someone has to maintain.
- Entra ID
- Single sign-on and conditional access — the main reason to be here.
- App Service or AKS
- Managed hosting with deployment slots, or Kubernetes when warranted.
- Azure SQL
- Managed SQL Server with point-in-time restore.
- Bicep or Terraform
- Infrastructure as code; Terraform if you also run elsewhere.
- Application Insights
- Application monitoring and tracing integrated with the platform.
Why Azure
Let’s talkIdentity done properly
Entra ID integration means single sign-on, conditional access and group-based permissions without a custom auth layer.
Enterprise agreements already exist
Most large organisations already have commercial terms, which shortens procurement considerably.
Strong hybrid story
Genuinely good support for estates that will keep part of their infrastructure on-premises.
What we get called in to fix
Get a second opinionResource sprawl across subscriptions
Resources with no consistent tagging or grouping, so cost cannot be attributed to anything.
Over-broad role assignments
Contributor granted at subscription scope where a resource-group role would do.
Networking assembled ad hoc
Virtual networks and peering added incrementally until nobody can draw the topology.
App Service plans oversized
Plans sized for a launch spike and never revisited.
Azure or the alternative
The comparisons we are actually asked to make, answered the way we would answer them on a call.
Azure for Microsoft-centric organisations and identity integration. AWS for service breadth and a larger experienced talent pool.
App Service for most web applications — far less operational surface. AKS when you actually need orchestration.
Bicep if you are Azure-only and want first-party. Terraform if you run anywhere else too.
Azure works well with:
AWS
Google Cloud
Python
Docker
Go
Grafana
Java
Kubernetes
MongoDB
Node.js
PHPGot an idea? Let’s make it real.
Tell us the short version
This could be the first step towards a new and successful collaboration. A one-line idea and a finished spec are both fine — tell us the problem, the deadline you’re working to and what’s in your way.
Keep looking
Frequently asked questions
Sometimes — usually when the founding team is .NET-native or an enterprise customer requires it. Otherwise the decision is more open.
Yes, including single sign-on, app registrations and role mapping into the application.
Yes, though we assess first. Lifting a badly behaved server into the cloud usually just relocates the problem.
Yes — app registrations, single sign-on, group-to-role mapping and conditional access as required.
Often, meaningfully. Hybrid benefit and committed spend can change the comparison entirely, so the list price is rarely the real number.