Originally reported by Help Net Security. Announcement attributed to Redis Labs, May 2020.
Redis Labs and Microsoft Form Strategic Partnership
Redis Labs announced a strategic agreement with Microsoft to deliver Redis Enterprise as new, fully integrated tiers of Azure Cache for Redis. The offering, initially available in Private Preview at the time of announcement, extends the standard Azure Cache for Redis service with enterprise-grade capabilities designed for mission-critical, large-scale workloads.
The partnership positions Redis Enterprise not as a separate product customers must manage independently, but as first-class tiers embedded directly within the Azure Cache for Redis experience — meaning procurement, billing, and management all flow through the familiar Azure portal.
What the Enterprise Tiers Add to Azure Cache for Redis
Standard Azure Cache for Redis is built on open-source Redis. The new enterprise tiers layer Redis Enterprise on top, unlocking capabilities that are not available in the open-source distribution:
- Redis on Flash: Extends the Redis dataset beyond DRAM by tiering data across NVMe SSDs, enabling terabyte-scale datasets at costs comparable to disk-based datastores.
- Redis Modules: Native support for purpose-built data models including probabilistic data structures, time-series, full-text search, and streams.
- Active geo-replication: Planned support for active-active, geo-redundant cache configurations suited to hybrid-cloud and multi-region architectures.
- Up-to-date Redis versions: Access to the latest Redis releases, including native data structures not yet available in older managed tiers.
Key Benefits for Azure Customers
Improved Developer Productivity
Because the enterprise tiers integrate directly into the Azure Cache for Redis interface, developers can provision a Redis Enterprise cluster within minutes using tools and workflows they already know. Native integration with other Azure services means applications can consume Redis Enterprise without requiring significant architectural changes.
Greater Resiliency, Security, and Compliance
The enterprise tiers come with stronger SLAs backed by Redis Enterprise’s active geo-replication technology, which maintains multiple active dataset replicas across regions. Network isolation support helps organizations meet security and compliance requirements for sensitive workloads.
Simplified Procurement and Lower Total Cost of Ownership
Redis Enterprise consumption is billed as part of the customer’s standard monthly Azure invoice, removing the need for a separate vendor relationship. Consumption-based pricing allows teams to scale their Redis footprint in real time, potentially reducing over-provisioning costs compared to fixed-capacity deployments.
Why This Matters: Moving Mission-Critical Workloads to Azure
For organizations migrating on-premises databases to the public cloud, a fully managed, enterprise-grade caching layer with strong SLAs and geo-redundancy addresses one of the most common concerns: data resilience and latency at scale. Redis on Flash in particular is relevant for teams whose datasets are too large to hold entirely in DRAM but still require low-latency access patterns that disk-based databases cannot match.
The active geo-replication roadmap item is especially significant for hybrid-cloud architectures, where a single cache cluster must serve both cloud-native and on-premises consumers with consistent, low-latency reads and writes.
What the Companies Said
“The new enterprise tiers of Azure Cache for Redis fulfills the desire we hear from customers for a fully managed cloud data store that provides significant cost savings for large datasets and the greatest simplicity to consume Redis Enterprise with the confidence and resilience they need from their data layer as they move to Azure.”
— Ofer Bengal, CEO and Co-founder, Redis Labs
“The integration with Redis Labs underscores Microsoft’s vision for a successful cloud and open source collaboration that serves the needs of developers and supports the open source ecosystem for continued innovation. We believe the new enterprise tiers of Azure Cache for Redis will help companies deliver their most critical applications with scale, high availability, and low latency.”
— Julia Liuson, Corporate Vice President, Developer Division, Microsoft
Availability
At the time of announcement in May 2020, the enterprise tiers of Azure Cache for Redis were available in Private Preview. Organizations interested in early access were directed to contact Redis Labs or Microsoft through their respective Azure and enterprise sales channels. General availability timelines were not disclosed in the original announcement.
Check the Azure Cache for Redis product page for current tier availability and pricing, as the service has continued to evolve since this announcement.