Azure Kubernetes Service Automatic: Fast and frictionless Kubernetes for all
AKS Automatic simplifies Kubernetes by offering a fully managed, opinionated experience that abstracts away from infrastructure complexity, while keeping the full power of Kubernetes at your fingertips. Learn how production-ready clusters and automated infrastructure operations can accelerate your time to delivery and simplify operations for you! Check out the announcement blog here!Join the Movement at Azure Dev Summit!
Azure Dev Summit is a chance for you to join a community of developers, architects, and tech leaders building with Azure, .NET, and Microsoft AI. This isn’t just another conference. It is a Microsoft-sponsored celebration of innovation, learning, and connection — and we’re bringing some of the most inspiring voices in tech to the stage. Find out more about the speakers at Azure Dev Summit and make sure to register! https://azuredevsummit.com/Sora 2 now available in Azure AI Foundry
Sora 2 in Azure AI Foundry stands out by combining OpenAI’s most advanced video generation capabilities with the trusted infrastructure and security controls of Microsoft Azure. And through Azure AI Foundry and our responsible AI principles, we empower customers with embedded security, safety, and privacy controls. Azure AI Foundry offers a curated catalog of generative media models, including OpenAI’s Sora, GPT-image-1 and GPT-image-1-mini, Black Forest Lab’s Flux 1.1 and Kontext Pro, and more to empower developers in your and customer organizations to serve creatives with new and unique capabilities, all without sacrificing the safety, reliability, and integration businesses expect. Learn more here!Partner Blog | What's new for Microsoft partners: October 2025 edition
Your voice is instrumental in shaping the future of the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program. In our latest quarterly update, we share key enhancements driven by partner feedback, along with expert insights, new skilling resources, and the latest benefits to help you grow, innovate, and lead in the AI era. Continue reading here!Now Generally Available: Azure Native Pure Storage Cloud for Azure VMware Solution
Co authored by: vjirovsky Azure Native Integrations enable you to easily provision, manage, and tightly integrate Independent Software Vendors (ISV) SaaS with a unified billing on Azure. By leveraging the power of Azure, Pure Storage Cloud Service offers you the same trusted Pure Storage capabilities in the cloud, without the complexity of refactoring or rearchitecting your VMware environments. You can easily discover and sign up for this via the Azure Marketplace. Azure Native Integrations enable you to easily provision, manage, and tightly integrate Independent Software Vendors (ISV) SaaS with a unified billing on Azure. By leveraging the power of Azure, Pure Storage Cloud Service offers you the same trusted Pure Storage capabilities in the cloud, without the complexity of refactoring or rearchitecting your VMware environments. You can easily discover and sign up for this via the Azure Marketplace. “We’re excited to announce Microsoft’s strengthened partnership with Pure Storage through the Azure Native Integrations program. With the service now generally available, customers can seamlessly deploy enterprise-grade block storage on Pure directly from the Azure portal. This seamless integration with Azure VMware Solution enables elastic capacity, flexible performance, and instant resizing – all while unlocking the full power of Azure’s cloud and AI capabilities.” - Scott Hunter, Vice President Product Management, Microsoft Developer Division Key Benefits of Azure Native Pure Storage Cloud on AVS Enterprise customers migrating VMware workloads to the cloud have long faced challenges with storage scalability, cost inefficiencies, and operational overhead. With this GA release, Pure Storage removes those barriers and delivers: Decoupled Scalability & Flexibility: across Compute and Storage solutions, so you pay only for what you need. Seamless Native Azure Experience: Provision Pure Storage Cloud resources via the client of your choice - Azure portal, CLI, PowerShell or SDK. Multi-Region support: Enjoy the support for your Pure Storage resource across East US, East US 2, West US 2, Central US and Australia East regions, with many more coming in shortly! Cost Efficiency: Achieve up to 40% Total Cost of Operations (TCO) savings through best-in-class data reduction and compression solutions. Streamlined VMware Migration: Simplify the transition of VMware workloads from on-premises or hybrid and multi-cloud environments onto Azure with consistent storage performance, nearly zero downtime, and minimal business disruption. Easy management: Perform all daily operations on AVS from a single VMware vSphere client directly via built-in plugin for Pure Storage Cloud Robust performance and reliability for mission-critical workloads with enterprise-grade Data protection and Data resilience support, with solutions such as Pure Snapshots and Hybrid Disaster Recovery in the pipeline. Fig 1: Pure Storage benefits of decoupled storage scalability. Why Pure Storage? Gartner report from Sept 2025 states that by 2029, consumption-based storage as a service (STaaS) will replace 50% of on-premises enterprise storage and data services infrastructure capital expenditure (capex), an increase from 15% in early 2025. Pure Storage® is a pivotal storage player among the Enterprise customers in revolutionizing the storage, management and resiliency while ensuring flexibility. From AI to archive, Pure Storage delivers a seamless cloud migration experience with one unified Storage as-a-Service (STaaS) platform across on-premises, private and public cloud, and hybrid environments. Pure has been named a Leader in the Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Enterprise Storage Platforms, with highest rating in Execution & Vision. An enterprise-favorite, some key customers for Pure Storage include ServiceNow, NASA, Comcast and many more! Fig 2: Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Storage Platforms, Sep 2025, Gartner Inc. Get Started with Azure Native Pure Storage Cloud Getting started is simple and fully integrated into the Azure experience. You can now start your journey quick and easy, and you pay only for the storage you use. For a detailed step-by-step visual guide, check out this YouTube playlist. Search and Provisioning the Pure Storage Cloud Resource Look for “Pure Storage Cloud” in the Azure portal or Azure Marketplace and sign up to subscribe. Select the service and create a new Pure Storage resource. Follow the instructions in the QuickStart to easily spin up your Pure Storage resource. Fig 3: Searching for Azure Native Pure Storage via Azure portal Create Storage Pools Using your Vnet and a delegated subnet to PureStorage.Block/storagePools, use the Overview blade navigation or the Action tile in the bottom to create and configure your storage pools. Fig 4: Newly created Pure Storage resource Overview in Azure portal Fig 5: Create Storage pool blade in Azure portal Connect to an Azure VMware Solution (AVS) resource Once created, you can use the Connect button up top to link your storage pool to AVS. In a few minutes, your storage pool is coupled with your VMware resource and ready to use! Fig 6: Connect AVS button establishes connection between storage pool and AVS resource Also, it automatically installs the Pure Storage Cloud plugin into your VMware resource, so you can manage everything, including the storage, from a single place, vSphere Client. Fig 7: Creation of a Datastore within the vSphere Client – this maps to a Storage container on your Pure Storage Cloud resource We’re excited for you to try out our solution! If you have suggestions or questions, contact us at azurenative@purestorage.com Resources Sign up for the service via Azure marketplace here. For a detailed visual guide on the step-by-step process to create a Pure Storage resource on Azure, check out this YouTube playlist. To learn more about the service, FAQ, and how to create your resource, check out the Microsoft docs as well as the Pure docs. Learn about how to create datastores and volumes and manage your Pure Storage here. Check out Azure Storage's blog and Pure’s press release for more excitement around the Pure-Microsoft partnership.Partner Blog | From migration to modernization: Building the foundation for AI-powered growth
Last month, we introduced the Cloud & AI Platforms blog series with a blog outlining how partners can lead customers into the AI era with a secure, agile foundation. This installment builds on that discussion, focusing on the pivotal role of migration and application modernization in helping organizations reduce costs, increase agility, and prepare their environments for AI-powered innovation. Building the foundation for AI-powered growth Today, partners are uniquely positioned at the forefront of one of the most significant opportunities in technology. As customers accelerate their shift from AI pilots to embedding intelligence across every layer of their operations, they’re also navigating rising costs, contract renewals, and security demands. In this landscape, customers need trusted advisors who can reduce complexity, deliver savings, and help build a secure foundation for sustained AI innovation. As a Microsoft partner, you play a pivotal role in driving this cloud transformation. By moving core workloads to Azure, organizations gain a scalable, secure cloud foundation that reduces cost and complexity while unlocking new opportunities for growth. IDC research shows that, for every dollar invested in generative AI, companies are realizing a 3.7x return on investment 1 —an increase from 3.5x the year before. When partners guide customers through migration and modernization with Azure, their customers unlock measurable business outcomes across three key pillars: Maximize business agility: Execute business changes up to 78% faster. Unlock AI with unified data: Reduce admin time by up to 60% with fully managed Azure databases and establish a secure, open foundation for enterprise AI. Realize best-in-class cost and performance: Achieve up to 76% savings running Windows Server and SQL Server on Azure compared to leading competitors. One study found a 298% ROI over three years with Azure VMware Solution (AVS). Continue reading hereUnleash the power of generative AI in your marketing strategies
In the recent Boost your marketing with GenAI and Through Partner Marketing webinar, we explored the top trends in marketing powered by generative AI (GenAI) and ways to leverage tools like Microsoft Copilot to accelerate go-to-market strategies.Partner Case Study | Intcomex
Many conferences leave attendees feeling overwhelmed as they juggle paper agendas, instantly forget names, and struggle to recall what exactly happened in meetings. Important conversations often get lost in the shuffle, letting opportunities slip through the cracks. Intcomex, an organization with operations across Latin America and the Caribbean, wanted to change all of that. Known for supporting a broad ecosystem of partners and customers across sectors, from cloud services to physical infrastructure, the company has earned a reputation for weaving data and intelligence into every layer of its operations. In partnership with Microsoft and Inovait––a specialized AI and Cloud Solution Provider–– Intcomex set out to bring that same intelligence to their flagship customer event. Instead of the standard event experience, Intcomex envisioned one where AI-driven, real-time insights empowered attendees to make the most of every session, meeting, and interaction. Reinventing the event experience “Most people leave events with just a bag of papers and no real recollection of what they did,” said Camilo Ballen, Cloud Sales Director for Latin America at Intcomex. For Intcomex, that fragmentation was creating pain points across the board. Attendees missed opportunities for valuable conversations simply because they didn’t know what was happening at any given time—or how to prioritize their attention. Booth staff, on the other hand, often had only a name and a badge to go on when greeting someone, without any background information that could help them convert or close a deal. Even with pre-event registration and digital agendas, there was no unified view of who had engaged with what, when or what content was sparking genuine interest. For a company that is known for being deeply data-driven, this lack of continuity between the digital and physical experience at their own events felt like a major miss. Intcomex wanted more than passive tracking or post-event reports, however. They envisioned a way to dynamically guide attendees in real time, enrich their conversations with intelligent context, and provide business insights that carried well beyond the final keynote. The goal wasn’t just to create a better event. It was to have a smarter, more connected experience that served both the customer and the business. Continue reading here Explore all case studies or submit your own Subscribe to case studies tag to follow all new case study posts. Don't forget to follow this blog to receive email notifications of new stories!Accelerating AI adoption for the US government
Federal agencies are at a crossroads: balancing rising costs with the need for faster innovation. That’s why Microsoft, together with the GSA, launched the OneGov offer, a foundation for secure and cost-effective modernization powered by our partner ecosystem. With OneGov, agencies can: ✅ Modernize legacy systems with Microsoft’s integrated cloud ✅ Accelerate AI adoption with Microsoft 365 Copilot, Azure, and Sentinel ✅ Unlock billions in savings through streamlined procurement and partner-led services Importantly, partners are at the heart of every deployment, driving transformation, securing mission-critical workloads, and enabling agencies to achieve mission outcomes faster. Learn more in Chris Barry’s blog: https://aka.ms/Partnerblog-AIadoptionforUSGOVVirtual Event | Becoming Frontier: Pitch and land the AI transformation story
Join us for a hands-on training designed to sharpen your AI transformation pitch. Over three days, you will dive into Microsoft’s latest executive, platform, business services, and security conversations, learn how to bring the Copilot and agentic story to life, and practice landing it with impact. With expert-led sessions, practical pitch decks, and live Q&A, you will leave with the confidence to guide customers through their AI journey and earn a shareable digital badge along the way. Americas | Tuesday, October 14, 9:00 AM - Thursday, October 16, 12:00 PM PDT Asia | Wednesday, October 15, 9:00 AM - Friday, October 17, 12:00 PM IST EMEA | Wednesday, October 15, 9:00 AM - Friday, October 17, 12:00 PM BST Register today!
