National Gas accelerates secure development with scalable remote desktops

National Gas, the operator of Great Britain's gas transmission network, faced urgent cloud migration and user provisioning challenges after divesting from National Grid. Without traditional laptops and working to tight deadlines, the company needed scalable, secure, and efficient remote access for in-house developers and other users spread across the UK. To address this, National Gas partnered with Capgemini to design and implement a greenfield Microsoft Azure environment, deploying Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) as the core platform for secure access. Automation using Terraform Infrastructure as Code and Intune enabled rapid, policy-driven virtual desktop deployment for varied user groups. The project prioritized ease of onboarding, automation, enhanced security, and cost efficiency, establishing single-session virtual desktops and integrating Azure security practices like location awareness, conditional access, and Privileged Identity Management. Most provisioning activities, updates, and application deployments were automated, reducing manual intervention and third-party tool reliance. Self-service features and robust automation simplified support and enabled swift updates and onboarding. Options like OneDrive for local profiles addressed high storage costs, while automated machine deallocation further optimized overhead. The solution quickly supported hundreds, then thousands, of diverse internal users—from developers to scientists and vendors—delivering scalability and enabling secure, flexible work environments. Streamlined processes ensured AVD could adapt to a range of business cases and requirements, facilitating future projects and innovations. Overall, the migration achieved fast delivery, reduced complexity and costs, and paved the way for ongoing transformation and digital modernization at National Gas.