Why Is Microsoft 365 Enterprise Needed to Provision an NFA Account?

Applies to: Nerdio For Azure (NFA) customers only 

Nerdio For Azure (NFA) account requires an Microsoft 365 account and an Azure subscription for:

• A Microsoft 365 subscription provides the best in class collaboration tools(MS Outlook, MS Office,etc.) in a secure and mobile environment.
  
• A Microsoft Azure subscription offers an ever-expanding set of cloud services to build, manage and deploy your applications as per your business needs.
  

Nerdio enforces certain minimum requirements on Microsoft 365 and Azure accounts, for provisioning an NFA account. Let us understand the minimum requirements for an Microsoft 365 account for the scope of this article.

Microsoft 365 minimum requirements for NFA

Due to Microsoft licensing requirements, NFA works with Microsoft 365 "Enterprise" accounts only. That includes the entire series of Enterprise licenses - E1, E3, E5, and so on. You can use an existing Microsoft 365 account or sign up for a new account. Click here to sign up for a free trial of Microsoft 365 E3 account.

Note: The Microsoft 365 account must have one available license.

As a new user, you will be assigned a virtual desktop running in Azure. And you will have Microsoft 365 installed on your virtual desktop. Now, in order to use the Microsoft Office suite installed on your virtual desktop, it must be activated with SCA (shared computer activation). It is important to note that only the "ProPlus" version of Microsoft 365 supports SCA. Microsoft 365 ProPlus is a user-based service that allows people to access Office experiences on up to 5 PCs or Macs and on their mobile devices. Unlike traditional Office installations which were tied to the computers they were installed on, Microsoft 365 ProPlus enables flexible deployment options that IT and/or individual users can choose from to install Office.

Since Microsoft 365 ProPlus is included with Microsoft 365 Enterprise plans, an Microsoft 365 Enterprise account is needed to provision an NFA account. Thus Office Business (part of Microsoft 365 Business Premium SKU), for example, cannot be installed on a virtual desktop in Azure.