This document discusses how Accenture modernized its IT infrastructure data platform by migrating to Microsoft Azure Cloud Data Services. Some key points: - Accenture wanted to revolutionize how it managed and analyzed infrastructure data to gain better insights and make more informed decisions. - It chose Microsoft Azure for its scalability, security, and ability to offer a cloud-native solution with minimal impact. - Migrating to Azure has provided numerous benefits like reduced costs, lower carbon footprint, improved analytics capabilities, and increased consistency and control. - Over 15 applications were migrated, processing over 600TB of data monthly while achieving 99.99% uptime. Insights from infrastructure data are now helping Acc

1. STORIES
Using Microsoft Azure Data
Services to drive digital
transformation, create meaningful
insights and deliver more value
New ways to apply
infrastructure data for better
business outcomes

2. Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved
Reinventing IT
infrastructure data
According to the 2022 Accenture
Technology Vision, 95% of global
executives believe that future
digital platforms need to offer
unified experiences, enabling
interoperability of data across
different platforms and spaces.
This majority view is confirmation
of the importance of harnessing
data and a further reminder of how
data has become integral to our
personal and professional lives.
We are all learning to think about
data in new ways—especially when it
comes to handling increasingly high
volumes. Our organization had
already shifted toward the cloud with
most of our applications, but our
legacy infrastructure data
architecture had yet to follow suit.
As we looked at our data insights
strategy for our business, we took a
similar point of view around our
infrastructure services. We wanted to
revolutionize the way we managed
and analyzed IT infrastructure data—
and, in doing so, we needed to place
the accent on prevention rather than
problem solving.
Our aim was to lower costs,
decrease our carbon footprint, scale
at speed and automate compliant
and repeatable infrastructure
deployments with greater
consistency and control.
Above all, we wanted the new
platform to offer business insights
that enabled better decision making
and improved the user experiences
of our people.
Call for change

3. Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved
Introducing a modern
data platform
When tech meets human ingenuity
To develop a modern data platform for our IT
infrastructure data, we chose to team with
Microsoft, a long-term collaborator and
recognized leader in data management and
business intelligence.
We were looking for a self-maintained system
(where secure patching and maintenance is
managed by Microsoft) that could help us to
establish a cloud-native architecture. We needed a
scalable central repository of IT infrastructure data
from multiple sources that delivered actionable
insights immediately for better overall user
experiences.
Our global IT team began the project by designing,
implementing and migrating existing legacy
applications prior to deploying Microsoft Azure
Cloud Data Services. A smooth transition meant
minimal impact and no downtime for global
consumers using those analytics applications.

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When tech meets human ingenuity
With one of our key sustainability
goals to achieve net zero emissions,
any reduction in our organization’s
carbon footprint is welcome. Using
MicrosoftAzure means data doesn’t
need to move between multiple
channels and vendors, helping us
lower transport distance and produce
less carbon—meaning we only
consume the energy we need and
no more.
The new cloud-based platform also
introduces a “pay as we go” model
based on consumption demand or
storage needs. Without fixed costs,
we can be more efficient, and can
lower administrative costs with
ticketless operations.
Accenture people are already familiar
with Microsoft products—for
instance, we are the largest
enterprise user of Microsoft Teams.
This understanding of the Microsoft
family of solutions means less of a
learning curve to get people up and
running with Microsoft Azure and
makes it simpler for them to start
using the platform.And with its easy-
to-use self-service onboarding hub—
the Microsoft Power Platform—data
is more democratized and adoption
is increased further.
Both Accenture and Microsoft are
large organizations with a global
footprint, sharing similar demands
around scale, global regulations and
compliance. It is these kinds of
synergies which foster a keen
understanding of our desired
business outcomes and how to
achieve them.
How Microsoft Azure
changes our business
Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved

5. Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved
Improving
analytics insights
A valuable difference
Today, all the infrastructure data from our
legacy system has been migrated to Microsoft
Azure, giving us a solid platform and reference
architecture. Microsoft Azure’s central
repository enables us to access high-quality
data that is catalogued for easy discovery and
accelerates time to insights.
Now, we can easily move any other new
infrastructure data into this platform, making our
infrastructure environment less reactive and more
insights driven. We migrated 15 infrastructure apps,
one of which is a homegrown application called
Protect My Tech (PMT), which auto-remediates
security compliance issues and is present on more
than 680,000 workstations across our organization.
Cloud services bring us higher speed, elasticity and
innovation. Our policy around development,
security and operations (DevSecOps) means we
have zero production vulnerabilities, protecting our
brand and intellectual property. And data stays
close to where it is generated, with lower emissions
in the public cloud than our legacy on-premise data
centers.

6. Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved
A valuable difference
What’s more, our cloud investments
in artificial intelligence and machine
learning (AI/ML) can enhance our
ability to explore the data and
capacities to identify patterns, trends
and business opportunities that were
previously out of reach. Earlier
Accenture research has found that
72% of C-suite executives focused
on advanced analytics said a core
data foundation is an important
success factor for scaling AI. It’s also
easier to use built-in cloud
capabilities to protect business
critical workloads against regional
and data center outages, keeping the
lights on and maintaining resilience.
To get started on improving your
analytics insights, here are some
helpful steps you can take:
• Prioritize change: Secure
appropriate funding and
leadership support. Obtain buy-in
from teams, ease pain-points and
be prepared for hiccups by
instituting a strong change
management plan before project
inception.
• Assess and plan: Invest time in
a thorough existing architecture
assessment and continue reviews
throughout the project to ensure
the design can perform and scale,
is driven by automated code and
secure from the start. Take
account of data quality and
validation from the get-go.
• Maintain flexibility: Allow teams
to ebb and flow as the project
continues. Invest in data
operations to accelerate the
design, development and
deployment of new components
into the data architecture so
teams can rapidly implement and
frequently update solutions based
on feedback.
• Address dependencies: Ensure
smooth handovers and encourage
trust between teams by
developing an appropriate RACI
matrix—Responsible,
Accountable, Consulted,
Informed—and having clear and
defined dependencies.

7. Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved
A valuable difference
600TB
data processed
monthly
175TB
data stored on
the platform
15
applications producing
insights
99.99%
uptime of migrated
applications
Managing the
future
As we look to the future, we’ll be tapping into the power of our
infrastructure data environment to drive artificial intelligence in
our operations and enhance automation. We’ll also be looking to
use data and cloud to support our organization’s target of net-
zero carbon emissions by 2025.
Finally, we’ll work toward multi-cloud data federation, where we can
empower users with a unified interface that eliminates multi-cloud
vendor complexities and provides a consistent user experience.
Insights like these are helping us further innovate how to best serve
our global organization.
In less than 12 months, we have:

8. Copyright © 2022 Accenture. All rights reserved
Meet the Team
Yakuta Rasheed
Senior Manager – Global IT,
Technology Vision & Strategy
Yakuta Rasheed
Merim Becirovic
Managing Director – Global IT,
Enterprise Technology
Merim Becirovic
Kamal Gulrajani
Senior manager – Global IT,
Technology Vision & Strategy
Kamal Gulrajani
Copyright © 2022Accenture.
All rights reserved.
Accenture and its logo
are trademarks ofAccenture.
Joaquin Castillo
Manager – Global IT, Technology
Vision & Strategy
Joaquin Castillo