Avere Systems, a provider of enterprise storage for the hybrid cloud, today announced a strategic relationship with Microsoft Corp. that will bring its Virtual FXT Edge filers to Microsoft Azure.

Customers can now deploy and scale cloud compute on-demand while using on-premises storage resources, making NAS data accessible to Azure without experiencing latency or requiring that data be moved to the cloud.

Avere's virtual NAS solution is easy to install and manage, provides multi-protocol file access (including NFS and SMB), and clusters to deliver high availability, scalable performance and capacity.

In a matter of minutes, enterprises can deploy thousands of Azure HPC instances on-demand to crunch data with low latency and no data migration. Businesses can tap into hyper-converged infrastructure of Azure with ease, without breaking the bank.

"At Avere, we've been dedicated to shattering the myth that organisations can't have enterprise NAS performance in the public cloud," said Rebecca Thompson, VP Marketing of Avere Systems.

"Now, working with Microsoft, we're helping enterprises harness the computing power of Microsoft Azure, the same infrastructure used by more than 57% of Fortune 500 companies, for all of their big data applications."

Nicole Herskowitz, Senior Director of Product Marketing, Microsoft Azure, said, "By integrating the near-infinite processing capabilities of Microsoft Azure, organisations will gain a tremendous business advantage as the power of this flexible, enterprise-grade cloud computing platform becomes an extension of their own IT infrastructure."