The fact that small and medium businesses stand to benefit the most from a remote workforce has not been lost on them. In fact, SMBs have been taking their business to the cloud faster and with greater motivation than their bigger counterparts. According to one report, the number of total organizations looking to embrace cloud for 100% of their workloads is set to increase by 70% in the next two years and 45% of these are SMBs. The reason for such a wholescale adoption of cloud technologies is but simple.

Today, cloud remote desktops are business critical.

The reality of a post-pandemic world has to do with a remotely located distributed workforce that is increasingly dependent upon remote and hybrid modes of working. As a rule, SMBs look to hire a considerable pool of overseas talent and this means, a significant portion of their critical workforce is located off-premises. To make the most of a diverse talent pool, available resources including remote desktop services need constant improvement, so employees can be more productive off-site than they would be on-site. Contrary to the commonly held notion, a workforce located at home or away from office is capable of delivering more because conflicts caused by work-life imbalance do scarcely arise here. However, for a home-based or mobile workspace to perform optimally, cloud remote desktops are crucial. Accordingly, remote desktop services offers a host of essential features that focus on remote access and consistent desktop performance.

Remote Desktops are what every SMB needs.

Remote working, in large part, depends on an employee's ability to deliver independently and outside of direct supervision. It can, therefore, gain substantially from managed desktop services that combine self-supervisory capabilities with maximum productivity. Cloud remote desktops must act in a way to relieve the employer's headache around what or how much a remote workforce can deliver. That is why, for remote desktop services to be the most effective, they should be entirely managed. Ace Cloud Hosting brings to the global SMB sector managed Remote Desktop Services that takes care of everything from server management to IT upgrades.

Remote Desktop Services, earlier known as Terminal Services, have been in play for a while now. The new phrase has mostly to do with the fact that terminal services are now being fully managed and equipped with a complete, end-to-end desktop experience. This need of the hour has arisen partly due to the emergence of a remote workforce after the pandemic, and partly because IT costs are greatly minimized. For SMBs to flourish, inessential cost-cutting is a must. Remote desktop hosting arms clients with the ability to divert funds from managing IT to managing business, thereby tremendously raising productivity levels and output cycles.

Myth-Busting 101: Remote Desktops are restrictive.

There's a bit of an adage that remote desktops are meant only for a remote workforce, and best avoided for in-office employees. It goes on to imply that remote desktops are somewhat limiting in their access, functionality, and features - so unless one really cannot do without them, there is no need for remote desktops. These presuppositions are not just wrong, they are contrary to the truth. In addition to the economical side of things, remote desktops are a great (perhaps, the greatest) way to amp up working capabilities of employees - whether located on or off premises. That is because, cloud remote desktops are high-performance and very easy to work with. They are typically offered as part of remote desktop services (RDS) and empower users to remotely access and work on Windows-based desktop sessions. Linux-powered sessions are also available, but most SMBs rely on Windows because it offers greater familiarity and ease of access among users. These sessions are built on cloud servers and delivered to end-user devices over a secure network. The reliability and security of the service comes down to the experience and reputation of the provider, and every competent RDS provider offers services that vouch for a richer and speedier desktop experience on remote desktops.

Thus, SMBs rely on a cloud-hosted remote desktop infrastructure not only for reasons of cost-effectiveness. It also guarantees greater access and faster computing performance. Usually, the management of such resource-intensive sessions along with the upkeep of high-end servers can get very complex and expensive. But, thanks to the end-to-end remote desktop solutions by providers like Ace Cloud Hosting, infrastructure maintenance is now handled by a group of dedicated experts situated off-premises.

Cloud Remote Desktops are for everyone, everywhere.

Fully managed remote desktop services are not worth their salt unless they offer 24*7 customer service. This means, come rain or shine, weekends or holidays, work goes on uninterrupted. It is also not enough to just be able to reach a call center. The ability to connect with on-site RDS experts and fix issues in real time is equally important. Competent service providers make sure that a solid customer support system forms an important aspect of their managed solutions.

And all things on a pay-as-you-go basis, so clients only pay for what they end up utilizing. In fact, this last feature holds special meaning to SMBs that frequently work on a scalable basis, with a variable workload and flexible workforce. To make the most of all available resources at any given point of time, remote access unleashes a hands-on approach to business-critical processes. All permissioned users - no matter their location or device capability - can access work data, run any number of applications, and work on a unified workspace towards reaching bigger goals.

So how do Remote Desktops make it all possible?

RDS cuts out on physical, on-premises infrastructure that is vulnerable to internal and external breaches. On-premises VDI is replaced with remote cloud servers hosted in data centers located in some of the world's safest, anti-intrusive locations. On the one hand, the presence of multiple data centers reduces chances of IT outage, and on the other hand, it makes sure that data is backed up and easily restorable. With data being stored in remote servers, vulnerabilities arising from end-user devices cannot compromise data-integrity.

The inclusion of state-of-the-art digital safeguards, such as multi-factor authentication system, TLS 1.3, antivirus, ransomware, and DDoS management, make sure that desktop operations take place in a protected environment with multi-layered security. Low-latency routes for desktop sessions imply the use of high-end SSDs (solid state drives) for optimal performance and zero lag. Faster processing time with minimal performance issues are the key to maximizing the potential of a remote workforce.

In conclusion

SMBs are known to operate on an "all-hands-on-deck" mode. Working with flexible resources and a low budget, however, does not spell lesser productivity or lower goals. The invasion of RDS into the SMB workspace has catapulted limited resources into unlimited possibilities, and the resulting sector-wide transformation has renewed hopes of "Start Small, Grow Big." Undoubtedly, the growth and potential of this sector has been driven in part by mobilizing a remote and distributed workforce. But that process of mobilization has only been possible due to the evolution of Remote Desktop Services. Cloud remote desktops bring together the need for high performance with the capabilities of a remote workforce by deploying a dedicated workstation that is secure, reliable, and accessible anytime, anywhere.

This is why, more SMBs in the future shall find them indispensable.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sayani Sinha is a senior technical writer with Ace Cloud Hosting. A career writer, her penchant for all things tech has found the perfect outlet in her many tech articles over the years. She works closely with other writers and the marketing team for ideation and production of content related to Virtual Desktop Infrastructure.

When not writing, she cheers for the Red Bull F1 team.