Building the Foundation for a Modern Desktop at Pennon
Designed strategically, deployed collaboratively - and ready for scale.
When Pennon decided it was time to evolve their desktop estate, the focus wasn’t just on modernisation - it was on doing it right. From day one, our approach was grounded in planning, partnership, and delivering something the organisation could build on long after the project concluded.
At INTEGY, we believe that the journey to a Modern Desktop begins with vision - a clear understanding of how people work, what the business needs, and how technology can empower that. With Pennon, we brought our Microsoft Intune Accelerator for Windows engagement to bear, helping them move with confidence toward a cloud-native, secure, and user-centric desktop environment.
Strategic Design First - Always
The success of any transformation begins with design. Working closely with the local team at Pennon, we provided clear guidance on what a modern desktop platform should look like, aligned to best practice and CIS benchmarks. Together, we shaped a blueprint for a scalable, cloud-first environment anchored in Microsoft Intune and Entra ID.
Rather than following the traditional hybrid-join model often a comfort blanket for legacy thinking we advocated strongly for an Entra ID-first approach. While there was some initial scepticism, especially with back-end workloads still joined to on-premises Active Directory, we demonstrated how modern identity architecture bridges these worlds securely and seamlessly.
Through Kerberos Cloud Trust, we enabled secure access to legacy resources using modern authentication tokens device, PRT (Primary Refresh Token), and Kerberos without compromising the cloud-native principles that make modern desktop management scalable and flexible.
This wasn’t about compromise. It was about doing it properly.
Making Intune Ready - Day One and Beyond
Our role was to make sure Pennon’s environment wasn’t just technically capable of using Intune but ready to make the most of it.
We configured and deployed user and device enrolment profiles tailored to Pennon’s needs. This included building out policy baselines aligned to the CIS framework, enabling device hardening, BitLocker encryption, Windows Update for Business configurations, and Attack Surface Reduction rules to elevate security from day one.
We ensured Windows Hello for Business was available as a passwordless authentication method from the start — improving both user experience and security posture.
We also packaged key applications for deployment, ensuring users had what they needed from the first login. Every element was aligned with cloud-first principles: automated, managed, secure.
Built with the Customer, Not Just for Them
What made this project different was the way it was delivered. This wasn’t a hand-off. It was a collaborative build. We worked incredibly closely with Pennon’s internal teams, providing not only the technical skills to configure and deploy, but the design insight and mentorship to enable their staff to take ownership of the platform going forward.
Upskilling wasn’t a tick-box exercise it was embedded in every step. We made sure the local team understood the rationale behind decisions, the mechanics of delivery, and how to operate and evolve the solution after handover.
Pennon now has a fully functioning, scalable Modern Desktop capability that aligns with Microsoft’s Modern Work vision and it’s theirs to grow.
This Is What We Do
As a Microsoft Partner with the Modern Work Enterprise designation, this is our space. We don’t just deploy technology we help organisations realise its potential, properly. Whether you’re looking to modernise device management, improve security, adopt cloud identity, or deliver better experiences for your users, we’re here to help you plan, build, and succeed together.
At INTEGY, we offer value from day one. That’s what Pennon experienced and that’s what we bring to every engagement.
Call us today on 01392 796525 or Email us at ask@integy.co.uk
