Azure ExpressRoute when it launched back in 2014 was for me, one of the most exciting propositions with Azure. The ability to rapidly provision, scale and consume PaaS and IaaS resources in the Microsoft Cloud however it lacked one thing and that was Office 365. Whilst many, many customers are adopting Office 365, having that traffic routed out over your internet connection for some people is seen as a security concern and for others it’s a bandwidth problem they just don’t want to deal with.
Earlier this week, the Office Team has posted a blog at http://blogs.office.com/2015/03/17/announcing-azure-expressroute-connectivity-to-office-365/ that Office 365 over Azure ExpressRoute is on the way although sadly not until Q3 2015.
The wait aside, this is great news both for customers seeking the maximum performance for their Office 365 deployments and their on-premise users and great news because it is another string in the public cloud productivity suites’ bow. I look forward to seeing that make it to the mainstream and seeing it in action.