Azure's NVv4 GPU instances expand virtualization for GPU sharing in cloud infrastructure.

The financial services industry has long leveraged virtualization for centralized data security, enhanced mobility, and improved disaster recovery, but broader adoption of virtualized systems has been constrained by the GPU requirements of essential applications such as trading consoles and visual analytics workstations. Most widely used software solutions in financial services require GPU support to ensure responsive interactivity under real-time demands. Prior to Microsoft's new NVv4 instance for Microsoft Azure, supporting these applications required providing each user's computer or workstation with access to a full, dedicated GPU in the data center—an approach that was expensive on a per-user basis and insufficient in improving IT maintenance burdens, while further complicating the implementation of the highest level of security these environments demand.

Azure NVv4 instances, powered by AMD 2nd Gen EPYC Processors and AMD Radeon Instinct GPUs, address these challenges and unlock new possibilities for financial services organizations. Azure is centralized in the cloud, enabling IT departments of large financial organizations to remotely deliver and update applications and roll out security patches across distributed environments spanning hundreds or thousands of branch offices. This centralization affords improved control and compliance oversight, allowing IT administrators to better optimize usage of costly software licenses and manage costs. Azure also supports end-users with an ultra-low-latency global data backbone that delivers a highly productive experience. The combination of AMD enterprise-grade CPU and GPU hardware with the NVv4 Windows 10 virtual instance ensures optimal compression for remote protocols that can overcome local limitations in networking and bandwidth, relieving IT of the need to install and modify leased offices as tablets and other portable devices become common in local banks, enabling staff to assist customers from convenient, comfortable locations rather than behind bulky workstations at fixed desks.

The Windows 10 environment supports key business applications including Bloomberg, Capital IQ, FactSet, and Thomson Reuters Eikon, all of which require GPU support to deliver the responsive, low-latency interactive experience users such as traders demand. Powered by the combination of AMD 2nd Gen EPYC processors and AMD Radeon Instinct GPUs, NVv4 instances address that challenge while providing IT managers with flexibility to choose the right-sized configuration for different types of users. Unlike on-premises data centers, where IT managers must purchase hardware and licenses, then install and service servers, NVv4 enables IT managers to simply and quickly provision resources from the cloud when adding new users to the workforce.

NVv4 provides significant security, compliance, and operational resilience benefits critical to financial services. Secure remote access ensures that data is locally replicated and can be backed up centrally in the data center, avoiding unmanaged endpoints. In electronic trading environments where downtime can lead to missed opportunities and significant financial loss, virtualized infrastructure provides critical redundancy to help ensure that vital data sources, compute and simulation resources, real-time analytics tools, and trading desktops remain online and accessible, enabling staff to work remotely and securely. Azure guaranteed Service Level Agreements for VMs typically guarantee in excess of 99.9 percent availability. Virtualization also allows financial institutions to provide sales channel partners with secure, limited, ring-fenced access to applications or data as needed, which is critical to maintaining compliance with FSA and GDPR legislation. Azure has a proven track record of supporting the compliance needs of enterprise, global financial services and banking organizations.