This morning, the UK woke up to an announcement from Microsoft that the UK datacentres for Azure and Office 365 are generally available, making Microsoft the first global provider to deliver a complete cloud (Iaas, PaaS and SaaS) from UK data centres.

MSFT first global provider to deliver complete #cloud from #UKdatacentres #Azure #Office365 https://t.co/xkiLpB0XX6 pic.twitter.com/QNODlBLS2e

— Microsoft Business (@MSFTBusinessUK) September 7, 2016

That means:

• Two new Azure regions in the UK:
  • UK West (Cardiff)
  • UK South (London)
• Office 365 services from UK datacentres in Durham and London.

Dynamics CRM online will be offered from the UK in the first half of 2017.

That Azure location information was taken from the Azure regions page on the Microsoft website (although my sources tell me that “Cardiff” is really “Newport” – close enough as to make no difference anyway, and London is probably “near London” too).  The Office location information was taken from the Office 365 Interactive Data Maps.

Now, UK customers already using Azure or Office 365 will be asking “will my data be moved to a UK datacentre?”. There’s no official announcement from Microsoft (not that I’ve seen) but my (unofficial) answer is “no”. At least not automatically.

For Azure, it’s good practice to design across multiple regions. There are also implications around geo-replication (which regions are paired with which for business continuity and disaster recovery purposes). Moving resources from one region to another is possible but is also a project that would need to be undertaken by a customer (possibly working with a partner) as a programme of planned resource moves.

For Office 365, it’s worth reading the TechNet advice on Moving core data to new Office 365 datacenter regions. At the time of writing it hasn’t been updated to reflect UK datacentres (it was last updated 28 July 2016) but it currently says:

“Existing customers that have their core customer data stored in an already existing datacenter region are not impacted by the launch of a new datacenter region”

[…]

“The data residency option, and the availability to move customer data into the new region, is not a default for every new region we launch. As we expand into new regions in the future, we’ll evaluate the availability and the conditions of data moves on a region by region basis.”

“New customers or Office 365 tenants created after the availability of the new datacenter region will have their core customer data stored at rest in the new datacenter region automatically.”

The page goes on to state that, assuming the data residency option is made available for the UK (remember, nothing has been announced yet)

“Customers will need to request to have their data moved within a set enrollment window.”

and that:

“Data moves can take up to 24 months after the request period to complete”

There’s also a footnote on the UK interactive data map to say:

“Customers who signed up and selected the United Kingdom for their Office 365 services before September 2, 2016 will have their customer data located in the EMEA datacenter locations.”

So, in short, Office 365 (SaaS) data stays exactly where it is, unless you sign up for a new tenant, or wait for further announcements from Microsoft. Azure (IaaS and PaaS) workloads can be moved to the new regions whenever you are ready.