Engage Squared, Velrada score Microsoft partner awards

Microsoft has honoured its top partners for 2021 at its Global Inspire Partner Awards, with a number of Australian partners receiving nods.

Melbourne-based Engage Squared was named Australian partner of the year for 2021, while Perth-based Velrada was awarded the 2021 Australian Growth award.

The Australian operations of Insight Enterprises and Thales Group have also earned honours in Microsoft’s global category partner awards, taking home the Solution Assessments award in the Business Excellence Category and the global Defence and Intelligence Award, respectively.

There were also ten Australian partners that were named finalists in their respective award categories.

“I can’t tell you how delighted I am to share the exciting news about our Australian and New Zealand partners who have performed brilliantly in Microsoft’s Inspire Global Partner Awards,” Microsoft Australia chief partner officer Rachel Bondi said.

“The competition for these awards is both intense and international – more than 4,400 submissions from 100 countries - and it’s testament to the commitment of our local partners, and the dedication of their people, that this region performed so well.”

Engaged Squared was honoured for its work with Bupa, where it deployed Office 365 to the insurer’s systems and also boosted its Microsoft Teams use amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The company was also a finalist in the Modern Workplace for Frontline Workers category.

Velrada meanwhile was recognised for developing its Dynamics 365 and Power Platform-based Power Roster platform, which was tapped to run the resourcing and logistics for this year’s G7 meeting in the United Kingdom held in June. The company also had BHP, Catholic Education Western Australia and law firm Maurice Blackburn.

Insight Enterprises Australia won the Solution Assessments award in the Business Excellence Category for co-developing the Data Estate Assessment in Australia with Microsoft’s global Solution Assessment team.

Thales Australia took home the global Defence and Intelligence Award for its Azure-based Nexium Defence Cloud Edge, built for the Australian Defence Force to enable forces to operate autonomously in the theatre of operations, for land, sea, air, cyber or space missions.

The partners who were finalists for Microsoft’s Inspire Global Partner Awards are as follows:

• Adopt & Embrace - Employee and Experience
• Barhead Solutions Australia – Power Apps and Power Automate
• Barhead Solutions Australia - Community Response
• Bremmar Consulting - Non-Profit
• Calibre One - Modern Workplace for SMB
• Data#3 - OEM Device Distributor/Reseller
• EY Australia - Education
• Myriad Technologies - Defence and Intelligence
• Quorum Systems – Security
• Velrada - Dynamics 365 Field Service

“Our Partner of the Year awards are designed to showcase the importance of the work our partners and their teams undertake and the impact that they have brought to bear,” Bondi added.

“There is impressive momentum across the entire partner community in Australia and New Zealand and I am confident that we can build on this success and continue to grow by delighting clients in the coming 12 months.”