Introducing Azure Container Apps Express!
Three years ago, a 15-second cold start was industry-leading. Today, developers and AI agents expect sub-second. The speed bar has moved, and the tooling needs to move with it. After running Azure Container Apps for years, we've learned something important: for most developers, the ACA environment is an unnecessary construct. It adds provisioning time, configuration surface, and cognitive overhead — when all you really want is to run your app with scaling, networking, and operations handled for you. At the same time, a new class of workloads has emerged. Agent-first platforms — systems where AI agents deploy endpoints on demand, spin up tool-use APIs, and tear them down when work is done — demand an even more radical focus on speed and simplicity. Every second of provisioning delay is wasted agent productivity. Today, we're launching Azure Container Apps Express in Public Preview — the fastest, simplest way to go from a container image to an internet-reachable app on Azure, ready for many production-style workloads. Note: Documentation links may not yet be available yet. They will become available throughout the day. What Is ACA Express? ACA Express removes the infrastructure decisions. There's no environment to provision, no networking to configure, no scaling rules to write. You bring a container image, Express handles everything else. Behind the scenes, Express runs your container on pre-provisioned capacity with sensible defaults baked in — so you skip environment setup without giving up ACA's serverless model. There's more coming in this space soon — keep watching. Here's what that means in practice: Instant provisioning — your app is running in seconds, not minutes Sub-second cold starts — fast enough for interactive UIs and on-demand agent endpoints Scale to and from zero — automatic, no configuration required (full scaling controls coming soon) Per-second billing — pay only for what you use Production-ready defaults — ingress, secrets, environment variables, and observability are built in Express is purpose-built for two audiences: developers who want to ship fast (SaaS apps, APIs, web dashboards, prototypes) and agents that deploy on demand (MCP servers, tool-use endpoints, multi-step workflow APIs, human-in-the-loop UIs). If you've ever waited for an ACA environment to provision, only to realize you didn't need half of the configuration options it asked you for — Express is your answer. What You Can Do Today Note: West Central US is currently the only available region. We will expand to new regions through the coming days. Express is in Public Preview starting today. It's a deliberate early ship — there's a meaningful feature gap compared to the existing Azure Container Apps offering, and we're filling it fast. New capabilities are landing on a rapid cadence throughout the preview, and by Microsoft Build in June, Express should be close to feature-complete. For the current list of supported features, known gaps, and what's on the way, see the Express documentation. We'd rather put valuable technology in your hands early and iterate with you than wait behind closed doors for perfection. Who Is Express For? Scenario Why Express SaaS apps and APIs Deploy and scale without infrastructure planning AI app frontends Chat UIs and copilot frontends that scale with usage spikes MCP servers Expose API endpoints for AI agents in seconds Agent workflows Spin up endpoints on demand, tear down when done Prototypes and startups Go from idea to production in minutes Web dashboards Internal tools with instant availability Get Started Express is available now in Public Preview. Try it: Azure Container Apps Express overview — concepts, capabilities, and the current feature support matrix Deploy your first app with the Azure CLI — step-by-step quickstart New Azure Container Apps Portal — create and manage Express apps alongside your existing Container Apps resources Have questions? Check the Azure Container Apps Express FAQ for answers to common questions about pricing, limits, regions, and the road to GA. We're building Express in the open and we want to hear from you. Tell us what features matter most, what works, and what doesn't — reach out on the Azure Container Apps GitHub or in the comments below.Running Foundry Agent Service on Azure Container Apps
Microsoft’s Customer Zero blog series gives an insider view of how Microsoft builds and operates Microsoft using our trusted, enterprise-grade agentic platform. Learn best practices from our engineering teams with real-world lessons, architectural patterns, and operational strategies for pressure-tested solutions in building, operating, and scaling AI apps and agent fleets across the organization. Challenge: Scaling agents to production changes the requirements As teams move from experimenting with AI agents to running them in production, the questions they ask begin to change. Early prototypes often focus on whether an agent can reason to generate useful output. But once agents are placed into real systems where they continuously need to serve users and respond to events, new concerns quickly take center stage: reliability, scale, observability, security, and long‑running operations. A common misconception at this stage is to think of an agent as a simple chatbot wrapped around an API. In practice, an AI agent is something very different. It is a service that listens, thinks, and acts, ingesting unstructured inputs, reasoning over context, and producing outputs that may span multiple phases. Treating agents as services means teams often need more than they initially expect: dependable compute, strong security, and real-time visibility to run agents safely and effectively at scale. When we kick off an agent loop, we provide input that informs the context it recalls for the task, the data it connects to, the tools it calls, and the reasoning steps it outlines for itself to generate an output. Agent needs are different from traditional services in hosting, scaling, identity, security, and observability; it’s a product with a probabilistic nature that requires secure, auditable access to many resources at the same lightspeed performance that users expect from any software. This isn’t the first time that the software industry needed to evolve its thinking around infrastructure. When modern application architectures began shifting from monolithic apps toward microservices, existing infrastructure wasn’t built with that model in mind. As systems were reconstructed into independent services, teams quickly discovered they needed new runtime architecture that properly accommodated microservice needs. The modern app era brought new levels of performance, reliability, and scalability of apps, but it also warranted that we rebuild app infrastructure with container orchestration and new operational patterns in mind. AI agents represent a similar inflection. Infrastructure designed for request‑response applications or stateless workloads wasn’t built with long‑running, tool‑calling, AI‑driven workflows in mind. As the builders of Foundry Agent Service, we were very aware that traditional architectures wouldn’t hold up to the bursty agentic workflows that needed to aggregate data across sources, connect to several simultaneous tools, and reason through execution plans for the output that we needed. Rather than building new infrastructure from scratch, the choice for building on Azure Container Apps was clear. With over a million Apps hosted on Azure Container Apps, it was the tried-and-true solution we needed to keep our team focused on building agent intelligence and behavior instead of the plumbing underneath. Solution: Building Foundry Agent Service on a resilient agent runtime foundation Foundry Agent Service is Microsoft’s fully managed platform for building, deploying, and scaling AI agents as production services. Builders start by choosing their preferred framework or immediately building an agent inside Foundry, while Foundry Agent Service handles the operational complexity required to run agents at scale. Let’s use the example of a sales agent in Foundry Agent Service. You might have a salesperson who prompts a sales agent with “Help me prepare for my upcoming meeting with customer Contoso.” The agent is going to kick off several processes across data and tools to generate the best answer: Work IQ to understand Teams conversations with Contoso, Fabric IQ for current product usage and forecast trends, Foundry IQ to do an AI search over internal sales materials, and even GitHub Copilot SDK to generate and execute code that can draft PowerPoint and Word artifacts for the meeting. And this is just one agent; more than 20,000 customers rely on Foundry Agent Service. At the core of Foundry Agent Service is a dedicated agent runtime through Azure Container Apps that explicitly meets our demands for production agents. Agent runtime through flexible cloud infrastructure allows builders to focus on making powerful agent experiences without worrying about under-the-hood compute and configurations. This runtime is built around five foundational pillars: Fast startup and resume. Agents are event‑driven and often bursty. Responsiveness depends on the ability to start or resume execution quickly when events arrive. Built‑in agent tool execution. Agents must securely execute tool calls like APIs, workflows, and services as part of their reasoning process, without fragile glue code or ad‑hoc orchestration. State persistence and restore. Many agent workflows are long‑running and multi‑phase. The runtime must allow agents to reason, pause, and resume with safely preserved state. Strong isolation per agent task. As agents execute code and tools dynamically, isolation is critical to prevent data leakage and contain blast radius. Secure by default. Identity, access, and execution controls are enforced at the runtime layer rather than bolted on after the fact. Together, these pillars define what it means to run AI agents as first‑class production services. Impact: How Azure Container Apps powers agent runtime Building and operating agent infrastructure from scratch introduces unnecessary complexity and risk. Azure Container Apps has been pressure‑tested at Microsoft scale, proving to be a powerful, serverless foundation for running AI workloads and aligns naturally with the needs of agent runtime. It provides serverless, event‑driven scaling with fast startup and scale‑to‑zero, which is critical for agents with unpredictable execution patterns. Execution is secure by default, with built‑in identity, isolation, and security boundaries enforced at the platform layer. Azure Container Apps natively supports running MCP servers and executing full agent workflows, while Container Apps jobs enable on‑demand tool execution for discrete units of work without custom orchestration. For scenarios involving AI‑generated or untrusted code, dynamic sessions allow execution in isolated sandboxes, keeping blast radius contained. Azure Container Apps also supports running model inference directly within the container boundary, helping preserve data residency and reduce unnecessary data movement. Learnings for your agent runtime foundation Make infrastructure flexible with serverless architecture. AI systems move too fast to create infrastructure from scratch. With bursty, unpredictable agent workloads, sub‑second startup times and serverless scaling are critical. Simplify heavy lifting. Developers should focus on agent behavior, tool invocation, and workflow design instead of infrastructure plumbing. Using trusted cloud infrastructure, pain points like making sure agents run in isolated sandboxes, properly applying security policy to agent IDs, and ensuring secure connections to virtual networks are already solved. When you simplify the operational overhead, you make it easier for developers to focus on meaningful innovation. Invest in visibility and monitoring. Strong observability enables faster iteration, safer evolution, and continuous self‑correction for both humans and agents as systems adapt over time. Want to learn more? Learn about building and hosting agents with Foundry Agent Service Discover agent runtime through Azure Container Apps Read about best practices for managing agentsWhy Does Azure App Service Return HTTP 404?
When an application deployed to Azure App Service suddenly starts returning HTTP 404 – Not Found, it can be confusing —especially when: The deployment completed successfully The App Service shows as Running No obvious errors appear in the portal This behaviour is more common than it appears and is often linked to routing, configuration, or platform : In this article, I’ll walk through real-world reasons why Azure App Service can return HTTP 404 errors, based on issues . The goal is to help you systematically isolate the root cause—whether it’s application-level, configuration-related, or platform-specific. What Does HTTP 404 Mean in Azure App Service? An HTTP 404 response from Azure App Service means: The incoming request successfully reached Azure App Service, but neither the platform nor the application could locate the requested resource. This distinction is important. Unlike connectivity or DNS issues, a 404 confirms that: DNS resolution worked The request hit the App Service front end The failure happened after request routing Incorrect Application URL or Route This is the most common cause of 404 errors. Typical scenarios Accessing the root URL (https://<app>.azurewebsites.net) for a Web API that exposes only API routes Missing route prefixes such as /api , /v1controller/action name segments Case sensitivity mismatches on Linux App Service Example https://myapp.azurewebsites.net Returns 404, but: https://myapp.azurewebsites.net/weatherforecast Works as expected. ✅ Tip: Always validate your routing locally and confirm the exact same path is being accessed in Azure. Application Appears Running, but Startup Failed Partially It is possible for an App Service to show Running even when the application failed to initialize fully. Common causes Missing or incorrect environment variables Invalid connection strings Exceptions thrown during Program.cs / Startup.cs Dependency initialization failures at startup In such scenarios, the app may start the host process but fail to register routes—resulting in 404 responses instead of 500 errors. ✅ Where to check Application logs Deployment logs Kudu → LogFiles Static Files Not Found or Not Being Served For applications hosting static content (HTML, JavaScript, images, JSON files), a 404 can occur even when files exist. Common reasons Files not deployed to the expected directory (wwor root, /home/site/wwwroot) Missing or unsupported MIME type configuration (commonly seen with .json) Static file middleware not enabled in ASP.NET Core applications ✅ Quick validation: Deploy a simple test.html to wwwroot and try accessing it directly. Windows vs Linux App Service Differences Behaviour can differ significantly between Windows App Service and Linux App Service. Common pitfalls on Linux Case-sensitive file paths (Index.html ≠ index.html) Missing or incorrect startup command Differences in request routing handled by Nginx ✅ Tip: If the app works on Windows App Service but fails on Linux, always recheck file casing and startup configuration first. Custom Domain and Networking Configuration Issues In some cases, requests reach the App Service but fail due to domain or network constraints. Possible causes Incorrect custom domain binding ✅ Isolation step: Always test using the default *.azurewebsites.net specific issues the issue is domain-specific. 6. Health Checks or Monitoring Probes Targeting Invalid Paths Seeing periodic 404 entries in logs—every few minutes—is often a sign of misconfigured probes. Typical scenarios App Service Health Check configured with a non-existent endpoint External monitoring tools probing /health or paths that do no exist ✅ Fix: Ensure the health check path maps to a valid endpoint implemented by the application. 7.Missing or Corrupted Deployment Artifacts Even when deployments report success, application files may not be where the runtime expects them. Commonly observed with Zip deployments WEBSITE_RUN_FROM_PACKAGE misconfigurations Partial or interrupted deployments ✅ Verify using Kudu: Browse /home/site/wwwroot and check files are present. Quick Troubleshooting Checklist If your Azure App Service is returning HTTP 404: Verify the exact URL and route Test hostingstart.html or a static file (for example, /hostingstart.html) Review startup and application logs Inspect deployed artifacts via Kudu Validate Windows vs Linux behaviour differences Review networking, authentication, and health check settings 8. Application Gateway infront of App Service If you have Application gateway infront of app service , please check the re-write rules so that the request is being sent to correct path. Final Thoughts HTTP 404 errors on Azure App Service are rarely random. In most cases, they point to: Routing mismatches Startup or configuration failures Platform-specific behavior differences By breaking the investigation into platform → configuration → application, you can systematically narrow down the root cause and resolve the issue. Happy debugging 🚀Announcing general availability for the Azure SRE Agent
Today, we’re excited to announce the General Availability (GA) of Azure SRE Agent— your AI‑powered operations teammate that helps organizations improve uptime, reduce incident impact, and cut operational toil by accelerating diagnosis and automating response workflows.Gemma 4 on Azure Container Apps Serverless GPU
Every prompt you send to a hosted AI service leaves your tenant. Your code, your architecture decisions, your proprietary logic — all of it crosses a network boundary you don't control. For teams building in regulated industries or handling sensitive IP, that's not a philosophical concern. It's a compliance blocker. What if you could spin up a fully private AI coding agent — running on your own GPU, in your own Azure subscription — with a single command? That's exactly what this template does. One azd up , 15 minutes, and you have Google's Gemma 4 running on Azure Container Apps serverless GPU with an OpenAI-compatible API, protected by auth, and ready to power OpenCode as your terminal-based coding agent. No data leaves your environment. No third-party model provider sees your code. Full control. Why Self-Hosted AI on ACA? Azure Container Apps serverless GPU gives you on-demand GPU compute without managing VMs, Kubernetes clusters, or GPU drivers. You get a container, a GPU, and an HTTPS endpoint — Azure handles the rest. Here's what makes this approach different from calling a hosted model API: Complete data privacy — your code and prompts never leave your Azure subscription. No PII exposure, no data leakage, no third-party processing. For teams navigating HIPAA, SOC 2, or internal IP policies, this is the simplest path to compliant AI-assisted development. Predictable costs — you pay for GPU compute time, not per-token. Run as many prompts as you want against your deployed model. No rate limits — the GPU is yours. No throttling, no queue, no waiting for capacity. Model flexibility — swap models in minutes. Start with the 4B parameter Gemma 4 for fast iteration, scale up to 26B for complex reasoning tasks. This isn't a tradeoff between convenience and privacy. ACA serverless GPU makes self-hosted AI as easy to deploy as any SaaS endpoint — but the data stays yours. What You're Building The template deploys two containers into an Azure Container Apps environment: Ollama + Gemma 4 — running on a serverless GPU (NVIDIA T4 or A100), serving an OpenAI-compatible API Nginx auth proxy — a lightweight reverse proxy that adds basic authentication and exposes the endpoint over HTTPS The Ollama container pulls the Gemma 4 model on first start, so there's nothing to pre-build or upload. The nginx proxy runs on the free Consumption profile — only the Ollama container needs GPU. After deployment, you get a single HTTPS endpoint that works with curl , any OpenAI-compatible SDK, or OpenCode — a terminal-based AI coding agent that turns the whole thing into a private GitHub Copilot alternative. Step 1: Deploy with azd up You need the Azure CLI and Azure Developer CLI (azd) installed. git clone https://github.com/simonjj/gemma4-on-aca.git cd gemma4-on-aca azd up The setup walks you through three choices: GPU selection — T4 (16 GB VRAM) for smaller models, or A100 (80 GB VRAM) for the full Gemma 4 lineup. Model selection — depends on your GPU choice. The defaults are tuned for the best quality-to-speed ratio on each GPU tier. Proxy password — protects your endpoint with basic auth. Region availability: Serverless GPUs are available in various regoins such as australiaeast , brazilsouth , canadacentral , eastus , italynorth , swedencentral , uksouth , westus , and westus3 . Pick one of these when prompted for location. That's it. Provisioning takes about 10 minutes — mostly waiting for the ACA environment to create and the model to download. Choose Your Model Gemma 4 ships in four sizes. The right choice depends on your GPU and workload: Model Params Architecture Context Modalities Disk Size gemma4:e2b ~2B Dense 128K Text, Image, Audio ~7 GB gemma4:e4b ~4B Dense 128K Text, Image, Audio ~10 GB gemma4:26b 26B MoE (4B active) 256K Text, Image ~18 GB gemma4:31b 31B Dense 256K Text, Image ~20 GB Real-World Performance on ACA We benchmarked every model on both GPU tiers using Ollama v0.20 with Q4_K_M quantization and 32K context in Sweden Central: Model GPU Tokens/sec TTFT Notes gemma4:e2b T4 ~81 ~15ms Fastest on T4 gemma4:e4b T4 ~51 ~17ms Default T4 choice — best quality/speed gemma4:e2b A100 ~184 ~9ms Ultra-fast gemma4:e4b A100 ~129 ~12ms Great for lighter workloads gemma4:26b A100 ~113 ~14ms Default A100 choice — strong reasoning gemma4:31b A100 ~40 ~30ms Highest quality, slower 51 tokens/second on a T4 with the 4B model is fast enough for interactive coding assistance. The 26B model on A100 delivers 113 tokens/second with noticeably better reasoning — ideal for complex refactoring, architecture questions, and multi-file changes. The 26B and 31B models require A100 — they don't fit in T4's 16 GB VRAM. Step 2: Verify Your Endpoint After azd up completes, the post-provision hook prints your endpoint URL. Test it: curl -u admin:<YOUR_PASSWORD> \ https://<YOUR_PROXY_ENDPOINT>/v1/chat/completions \ -H "Content-Type: application/json" \ -d '{ "model": "gemma4:e4b", "messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "Hello!"}] }' You should get a JSON response with Gemma 4's reply. The endpoint is fully OpenAI-compatible — it works with any tool or SDK that speaks the OpenAI API format. Step 3: Connect OpenCode Here's where it gets powerful. OpenCode is a terminal-based AI coding agent — think GitHub Copilot, but running in your terminal and pointing at whatever model backend you choose. The azd up post-provision hook automatically generates an opencode.json in your project directory with the correct endpoint and credentials. If you need to create it manually: { "$schema": "https://opencode.ai/config.json", "provider": { "gemma4-aca": { "npm": "@ai-sdk/openai-compatible", "name": "Gemma 4 on ACA", "options": { "baseURL": "https://<YOUR_PROXY_ENDPOINT>/v1", "headers": { "Authorization": "Basic <BASE64_OF_admin:YOUR_PASSWORD>" } }, "models": { "gemma4:e4b": { "name": "Gemma 4 e4b (4B)" } } } } } Generate the Base64 value: echo -n "admin:YOUR_PASSWORD" | base64 Now run it: opencode run -m "gemma4-aca/gemma4:e4b" "Write a binary search in Rust" That command sends your prompt to Gemma 4 running on your ACA GPU, and streams the response back to your terminal. Every token is generated on your infrastructure. Nothing leaves your subscription. For interactive sessions, launch the TUI: opencode Select your model with /models , pick Gemma 4, and start coding. OpenCode supports file editing, code generation, refactoring, and multi-turn conversations — all powered by your private Gemma 4 instance. The Privacy Case This matters most for teams that can't send code to external APIs: HIPAA-regulated healthcare apps — patient data in code, schema definitions, and test fixtures stays in your Azure subscription Financial services — proprietary trading algorithms and risk models never leave your network boundary Defense and government — classified or CUI-adjacent codebases get AI assistance without external data processing agreements Startups with sensitive IP — your secret sauce stays secret, even while you use AI to build faster With ACA serverless GPU, you're not running a VM or managing a Kubernetes cluster to get this privacy. It's a managed container with a GPU attached. Azure handles the infrastructure, you own the data boundary. Clean Up When you're done: azd down This tears down all Azure resources. Since ACA serverless GPU bills only while your containers are running, you can also scale to zero replicas to pause costs without destroying the environment. Get Started 📖 gemma4-on-aca on GitHub — clone it, run azd up , and you're live 🤖 OpenCode — the terminal AI agent that connects to your Gemma 4 endpoint 📌 Gemma 4 docs — model architecture and capabilities 📌 ACA serverless GPU — GPU regions and workload profile detailsAzure Functions Ignite 2025 Update
Azure Functions is redefining event-driven applications and high-scale APIs in 2025, accelerating innovation for developers building the next generation of intelligent, resilient, and scalable workloads. This year, our focus has been on empowering AI and agentic scenarios: remote MCP server hosting, bulletproofing agents with Durable Functions, and first-class support for critical technologies like OpenTelemetry, .NET 10 and Aspire. With major advances in serverless Flex Consumption, enhanced performance, security, and deployment fundamentals across Elastic Premium and Flex, Azure Functions is the platform of choice for building modern, enterprise-grade solutions. Remote MCP Model Context Protocol (MCP) has taken the world by storm, offering an agent a mechanism to discover and work deeply with the capabilities and context of tools. When you want to expose MCP/tools to your enterprise or the world securely, we recommend you think deeply about building remote MCP servers that are designed to run securely at scale. Azure Functions is uniquely optimized to run your MCP servers at scale, offering serverless and highly scalable features of Flex Consumption plan, plus two flexible programming model options discussed below. All come together using the hardened Functions service plus new authentication modes for Entra and OAuth using Built-in authentication. Remote MCP Triggers and Bindings Extension GA Back in April, we shared a new extension that allows you to author MCP servers using functions with the MCP tool trigger. That MCP extension is now generally available, with support for C#(.NET), Java, JavaScript (Node.js), Python, and Typescript (Node.js). The MCP tool trigger allows you to focus on what matters most: the logic of the tool you want to expose to agents. Functions will take care of all the protocol and server logistics, with the ability to scale out to support as many sessions as you want to throw at it. [Function(nameof(GetSnippet))] public object GetSnippet( [McpToolTrigger(GetSnippetToolName, GetSnippetToolDescription)] ToolInvocationContext context, [BlobInput(BlobPath)] string snippetContent ) { return snippetContent; } New: Self-hosted MCP Server (Preview) If you’ve built servers with official MCP SDKs and want to run them as remote cloud‑scale servers without re‑writing any code, this public preview is for you. You can now self‑host your MCP server on Azure Functions—keep your existing Python, TypeScript, .NET, or Java code and get rapid 0 to N scaling, built-in server authentication and authorization, consumption-based billing, and more from the underlying Azure Functions service. This feature complements the Azure Functions MCP extension for building MCP servers using the Functions programming model (triggers & bindings). Pick the path that fits your scenario—build with the extension or standard MCP SDKs. Either way you benefit from the same scalable, secure, and serverless platform. Use the official MCP SDKs: # MCP.tool() async def get_alerts(state: str) -> str: """Get weather alerts for a US state. Args: state: Two-letter US state code (e.g. CA, NY) """ url = f"{NWS_API_BASE}/alerts/active/area/{state}" data = await make_nws_request(url) if not data or "features" not in data: return "Unable to fetch alerts or no alerts found." if not data["features"]: return "No active alerts for this state." alerts = [format_alert(feature) for feature in data["features"]] return "\n---\n".join(alerts) Use Azure Functions Flex Consumption Plan's serverless compute using Custom Handlers in host.json: { "version": "2.0", "configurationProfile": "mcp-custom-handler", "customHandler": { "description": { "defaultExecutablePath": "python", "arguments": ["weather.py"] }, "http": { "DefaultAuthorizationLevel": "anonymous" }, "port": "8000" } } Learn more about MCPTrigger and self-hosted MCP servers at https://aka.ms/remote-mcp Built-in MCP server authorization (Preview) The built-in authentication and authorization feature can now be used for MCP server authorization, using a new preview option. You can quickly define identity-based access control for your MCP servers with Microsoft Entra ID or other OpenID Connect providers. Learn more at https://aka.ms/functions-mcp-server-authorization. Better together with Foundry agents Microsoft Foundry is the starting point for building intelligent agents, and Azure Functions is the natural next step for extending those agents with remote MCP tools. Running your tools on Functions gives you clean separation of concerns, reuse across multiple agents, and strong security isolation. And with built-in authorization, Functions enables enterprise-ready authentication patterns, from calling downstream services with the agent’s identity to operating on behalf of end users with their delegated permissions. Build your first remote MCP server and connect it to your Foundry agent at https://aka.ms/foundry-functions-mcp-tutorial. Agents Microsoft Agent Framework 2.0 (Public Preview Refresh) We’re excited about the preview refresh 2.0 release of Microsoft Agent Framework that builds on battle hardened work from Semantic Kernel and AutoGen. Agent Framework is an outstanding solution for building multi-agent orchestrations that are both simple and powerful. Azure Functions is a strong fit to host Agent Framework with the service’s extreme scale, serverless billing, and enterprise grade features like VNET networking and built-in auth. Durable Task Extension for Microsoft Agent Framework (Preview) The durable task extension for Microsoft Agent Framework transforms how you build production-ready, resilient and scalable AI agents by bringing the proven durable execution (survives crashes and restarts) and distributed execution (runs across multiple instances) capabilities of Azure Durable Functions directly into the Microsoft Agent Framework. Combined with Azure Functions for hosting and event-driven execution, you can now deploy stateful, resilient AI agents that automatically handle session management, failure recovery, and scaling, freeing you to focus entirely on your agent logic. Key features of the durable task extension include: Serverless Hosting: Deploy agents on Azure Functions with auto-scaling from thousands of instances to zero, while retaining full control in a serverless architecture. Automatic Session Management: Agents maintain persistent sessions with full conversation context that survives process crashes, restarts, and distributed execution across instances Deterministic Multi-Agent Orchestrations: Coordinate specialized durable agents with predictable, repeatable, code-driven execution patterns Human-in-the-Loop with Serverless Cost Savings: Pause for human input without consuming compute resources or incurring costs Built-in Observability with Durable Task Scheduler: Deep visibility into agent operations and orchestrations through the Durable Task Scheduler UI dashboard Create a durable agent: endpoint = os.getenv("AZURE_OPENAI_ENDPOINT") deployment_name = os.getenv("AZURE_OPENAI_DEPLOYMENT_NAME", "gpt-4o-mini") # Create an AI agent following the standard Microsoft Agent Framework pattern agent = AzureOpenAIChatClient( endpoint=endpoint, deployment_name=deployment_name, credential=AzureCliCredential() ).create_agent( instructions="""You are a professional content writer who creates engaging, well-structured documents for any given topic. When given a topic, you will: 1. Research the topic using the web search tool 2. Generate an outline for the document 3. Write a compelling document with proper formatting 4. Include relevant examples and citations""", name="DocumentPublisher", tools=[ AIFunctionFactory.Create(search_web), AIFunctionFactory.Create(generate_outline) ] ) # Configure the function app to host the agent with durable session management app = AgentFunctionApp(agents=[agent]) app.run() Durable Task Scheduler dashboard for agent and agent workflow observability and debugging For more information on the durable task extension for Agent Framework, see the announcement: https://aka.ms/durable-extension-for-af-blog. Flex Consumption Updates As you know, Flex Consumption means serverless without compromise. It combines elastic scale and pay‑for‑what‑you‑use pricing with the controls you expect: per‑instance concurrency, longer executions, VNet/private networking, and Always Ready instances to minimize cold starts. Since launching GA at Ignite 2024 last year, Flex Consumption has had tremendous growth with over 1.5 billion function executions per day and nearly 40 thousand apps. Here’s what’s new for Ignite 2025: 512 MB instance size (GA). Right‑size lighter workloads, scale farther within default quota. Availability Zones (GA). Distribute instances across zones. Rolling updates (Public Preview). Unlock zero-downtime deployments of code or config by setting a single configuration. See below for more information. Even more improvements including: new diagnostic settingsto route logs/metrics, use Key Vault App Config references, new regions, and Custom Handler support. To get started, review Flex Consumption samples, or dive into the documentation to see how Flex can support your workloads. Migrating to Azure Functions Flex Consumption Migrating to Flex Consumption is simple with our step-by-step guides and agentic tools. Move your Azure Functions apps or AWS Lambda workloads, update your code and configuration, and take advantage of new automation tools. With Linux Consumption retiring, now is the time to switch. For more information, see: Migrate Consumption plan apps to the Flex Consumption plan Migrate AWS Lambda workloads to Azure Functions Durable Functions Durable Functions introduces powerful new features to help you build resilient, production-ready workflows: Distributed Tracing: lets you track requests across components and systems, giving you deep visibility into orchestration and activities with support for App Insights and OpenTelemetry. Extended Sessions support in .NET isolated: improves performance by caching orchestrations in memory, ideal for fast sequential activities and large fan-out/fan-in patterns. Orchestration versioning (public preview): enables zero-downtime deployments and backward compatibility, so you can safely roll out changes without disrupting in-flight workflows Durable Task Scheduler Updates Durable Task Scheduler Dedicated SKU (GA): Now generally available, the Dedicated SKU offers advanced orchestration for complex workflows and intelligent apps. It provides predictable pricing for steady workloads, automatic checkpointing, state protection, and advanced monitoring for resilient, reliable execution. Durable Task Scheduler Consumption SKU (Public Preview): The new Consumption SKU brings serverless, pay-as-you-go orchestration to dynamic and variable workloads. It delivers the same orchestration capabilities with flexible billing, making it easy to scale intelligent applications as needed. For more information see: https://aka.ms/dts-ga-blog OpenTelemetry support in GA Azure Functions OpenTelemetry is now generally available, bringing unified, production-ready observability to serverless applications. Developers can now export logs, traces, and metrics using open standards—enabling consistent monitoring and troubleshooting across every workload. Key capabilities include: Unified observability: Standardize logs, traces, and metrics across all your serverless workloads for consistent monitoring and troubleshooting. Vendor-neutral telemetry: Integrate seamlessly with Azure Monitor or any OpenTelemetry-compliant backend, ensuring flexibility and choice. Broad language support: Works with .NET (isolated), Java, JavaScript, Python, PowerShell, and TypeScript. Start using OpenTelemetry in Azure Functions today to unlock standards-based observability for your apps. For step-by-step guidance on enabling OpenTelemetry and configuring exporters for your preferred backend, see the documentation. Deployment with Rolling Updates (Preview) Achieving zero-downtime deployments has never been easier. The Flex Consumption plan now offers rolling updates as a site update strategy. Set a single property, and all future code deployments and configuration changes will be released with zero-downtime. Instead of restarting all instances at once, the platform now drains existing instances in batches while scaling out the latest version to match real-time demand. This ensures uninterrupted in-flight executions and resilient throughput across your HTTP, non-HTTP, and Durable workloads – even during intensive scale-out scenarios. Rolling updates are now in public preview. Learn more at https://aka.ms/functions/rolling-updates. Secure Identity and Networking Everywhere By Design Security and trust are paramount. Azure Functions incorporates proven best practices by design, with full support for managed identity—eliminating secrets and simplifying secure authentication and authorization. Flex Consumption and other plans offer enterprise-grade networking features like VNETs, private endpoints, and NAT gateways for deep protection. The Azure Portal streamlines secure function creation, and updated scenarios and samples showcase these identity and networking capabilities in action. Built-in authentication (discussed above) enables inbound client traffic to use identity as well. Check out our updated Functions Scenarios page with quickstarts or our secure samples gallery to see these identity and networking best practices in action. .NET 10 Azure Functions now supports .NET 10, bringing in a great suite of new features and performance benefits for your code. .NET 10 is supported on the isolated worker model, and it’s available for all plan types except Linux Consumption. As a reminder, support ends for the legacy in-process model on November 10, 2026, and the in-process model is not being updated with .NET 10. To stay supported and take advantage of the latest features, migrate to the isolated worker model. Aspire Aspire is an opinionated stack that simplifies development of distributed applications in the cloud. The Azure Functions integration for Aspire enables you to develop, debug, and orchestrate an Azure Functions .NET project as part of an Aspire solution. Aspire publish directly deploys to your functions to Azure Functions on Azure Container Apps. Aspire 13 includes an updated preview version of the Functions integration that acts as a release candidate with go-live support. The package will be moved to GA quality with Aspire 13.1. Java 25, Node.js 24 Azure Functions now supports Java 25 and Node.js 24 in preview. You can now develop functions using these versions locally and deploy them to Azure Functions plans. Learn how to upgrade your apps to these versions here In Summary Ready to build what’s next? Update your Azure Functions Core Tools today and explore the latest samples and quickstarts to unlock new capabilities for your scenarios. The guided quickstarts run and deploy in under 5 minutes, and incorporate best practices—from architecture to security to deployment. We’ve made it easier than ever to scaffold, deploy, and scale real-world solutions with confidence. The future of intelligent, scalable, and secure applications starts now—jump in and see what you can create!
Bring Your Own Model (BYOM) for Azure AI Applications using Azure Machine Learning
Modern AI-powered applications running on Azure increasingly require flexibility in model choice. While managed model catalogs accelerate time to value, real-world enterprise applications often need to: Host open‑source or fine‑tuned models Deploy domain‑specific or regulated models inside a tenant boundary Maintain tight control over runtime environments and versions Integrate AI inference into existing application architectures This is where Bring Your Own Model (BYOM) becomes a core architectural capability, not just an AI feature. In this post, we’ll walk through a production-ready BYOM pattern for Azure applications, using: Azure Machine Learning as the model lifecycle and inference platform Azure-hosted applications (and optionally Microsoft Foundry) as the orchestration layer The focus is on building scalable, governable AI-powered apps on Azure, not platform lock‑in. We use SmolLM‑135M as a reference model. The same pattern applies to any open‑source or proprietary model. Reference Architecture: Azure BYOM for AI Applications At a high level, the responsibilities are clearly separated: Azure Layer Responsibility Azure Application Layer API, app logic, orchestration, agent logic Azure Machine Learning Model registration, environments, scalable inference Azure Identity & Networking Authentication, RBAC, private endpoints Key principle: Applications orchestrate. Azure ML executes the model. This keeps AI workloads modular, auditable, and production-safe. BYOM Workflow Overview Provision Azure Machine Learning Create Azure ML compute Author code in an Azure ML notebook Download and package the model Register the model Define a reproducible inference environment Implement scoring logic Deploy a managed online endpoint Use the endpoint from Microsoft Foundry Step 1: Provision Azure Machine Learning An Azure ML workspace is the governance boundary for BYOM: Model versioning and lineage Environment definitions Secure endpoint hosting Auditability Choose region carefully for latency, data residency, and networking. Step 2: Create Azure ML Compute (Compute Instance) Create a Compute Instance in Azure ML Studio. Why this matters: Managed Jupyter environment Identity integrated (no secrets in notebooks) Ideal for model packaging and testing - Enable auto‑shutdown for cost control - CPU is sufficient for most development workflows Step 3: Create an Azure ML Notebook Open Azure ML Studio → Notebooks Create a new Python notebook Select the Python SDK v2 kernel This notebook will handle the entire BYOM lifecycle. Step 4: Connect to the Azure ML Workspace # Import Azure ML SDK client from azure.ai.ml import MLClient # Import identity library for secure authentication from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential # Define workspace details subscription_id = "<SUBSCRIPTION_ID>" resource_group = "<RESOURCE_GROUP>" workspace_name = "<WORKSPACE_NAME>" # Create MLClient using Microsoft Entra ID # No keys or secrets are embedded in code ml_client = MLClient( DefaultAzureCredential(), subscription_id, resource_group, workspace_name ) The code above uses enterprise identity and aligns with zero‑trust practices. Step 5: Download and Package Model Artifacts from transformers import AutoModelForCausalLM, AutoTokenizer import os # Hugging Face model identifier model_id = "HuggingFaceTB/SmolLM-135M" # Local directory where model artifacts will be stored model_dir = "smollm_135m" os.makedirs(model_dir, exist_ok=True) # Download model weights model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained(model_id) # Download tokenizer tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained(model_id) # Save artifacts locally model.save_pretrained(model_dir) tokenizer.save_pretrained(model_dir) 🔹 Open‑source or proprietary models follow the same packaging pattern 🔹 Azure ML treats all registered models identically Step 6: Register the Model in Azure ML Register the packaged artifacts as a custom model asset. Optionally, developers can: Enables version tracking Supports rolling upgrades Integrates with CI/CD pipelines This is the foundation for repeatable inference deployments. from azure.ai.ml.entities import Model # Create a model asset in Azure ML registered_model = Model( path=model_dir, name="SmolLM-135M", description="BYOM model for Microsoft Foundry extensibility", type="custom_model" ) # Register (or update) the model ml_client.models.create_or_update(registered_model) Step 7: Define a Reproducible Inference Environment name: dev-hf-base channels: - conda-forge dependencies: - python=3.12 - numpy=2.3.1 - pip=25.1.1 - scipy=1.16.1 - pip: - azureml-inference-server-http==1.4.1 - inference-schema[numpy-support] - accelerate==1.10.0 - einops==0.8.1 - torch==2.0.0 - transformers==4.55.2 ⚠️ Environment management is the hardest part of BYOM ✅ Treat environment changes like code changes BYOM Inference Patterns The same model can expose multiple behaviors. Pattern 1: Text Generation Endpoint This is the most common pattern for AI-powered applications: REST-based text generation Stateless inference Horizontal scaling through Azure ML managed endpoints Ideal for: Copilots Chat APIs Summarization or content generation services Scoring Script (score.py) import os import json import torch from transformers import AutoTokenizer, AutoModelForCausalLM def init(): """ Called once when the container starts. Loads the model and tokenizer into memory. """ global model, tokenizer # Azure ML injects model path at runtime model_dir = os.getenv("AZUREML_MODEL_DIR") tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained(model_dir) model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained(model_dir) model.eval() def run(raw_data): """ Called for each inference request. Expects JSON input with a 'prompt' field. """ data = json.loads(raw_data) prompt = data.get("prompt", "") # Tokenize input text inputs = tokenizer(prompt, return_tensors="pt") # Generate text without tracking gradients with torch.no_grad(): outputs = model.generate(**inputs, max_new_tokens=100) # Decode output tokens into text response_text = tokenizer.decode(outputs[0], skip_special_tokens=True) return {"response": response_text} Example Request { "prompt": "Summarize the BYOM pattern in one sentence." } Example Response { "response": "Bring Your Own Model (BYOM) allows organizations to extend Microsoft Foundry with custom models hosted on Azure Machine Learning while maintaining enterprise governance and scalability." } Pattern 2: Predictive / Token Rank Analysis The same model can expose non-generative behaviors, such as: Token likelihood analysis Ranking or scoring Model introspection services This enables AI-backed analytics capabilities, not just chat. import torch from transformers import AutoModelForCausalLM, AutoTokenizer class PredictiveAnalysisModel: """ Computes the rank of each token based on the model's next-token probability distribution. """ def init(self, model, tokenizer): self.model = model self.tokenizer = tokenizer self.model.eval() def analyze(self, text): tokens = self.tokenizer.tokenize(text) token_ids = self.tokenizer.convert_tokens_to_ids(tokens) # Start with BOS token input_sequence = [self.tokenizer.bos_token_id, *token_ids] results = [] for i in range(len(token_ids)): context = input_sequence[: i + 1] model_input = torch.tensor([context]) with torch.no_grad(): outputs = self.model(model_input) logits = outputs.logits[0, -1] sorted_indices = torch.argsort(logits, descending=True) actual_token = token_ids[i] rank = (sorted_indices == actual_token).nonzero(as_tuple=True)[0].item() results.append({ "token": tokens[i], "rank": rank }) return results @classmethod def from_disk(cls, model_path): model = AutoModelForCausalLM.from_pretrained(model_path) tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained(model_path) return cls(model, tokenizer) Scoring Script (score.py) import os from predictive_analysis import PredictiveAnalysisModel def init(): """ Loads predictive analysis model from disk. """ global model model_dir = os.getenv("AZUREML_MODEL_DIR") model = PredictiveAnalysisModel.from_disk(model_dir) def run(text: str): """ Accepts raw text input and returns token ranks. """ return { "token_ranks": model.analyze(text) } Example Request { "text": "This is a test." } Example Response { "token_ranks": [ { "token": "This", "rank": 518 }, { "token": " is", "rank": 2 }, { "token": " a", "rank": 0 }, { "token": " test", "rank": 33 }, { "token": ".", "rank": 77 } ] } Consuming the BYOM Endpoint from Azure Applications Azure ML endpoints are external inference services consumed by apps. Option A: Application-Controlled Invocation App calls Azure ML endpoint directly IAM, networking, and retries controlled by the app Recommended for most production systems import requests import os AML_ENDPOINT = os.environ["AML_ENDPOINT"] AML_KEY = os.environ["AML_KEY"] headers = { "Authorization": f"Bearer {AML_KEY}", "Content-Type": "application/json" } payload = { "prompt": "Summarize BYOM in one sentence." } response = requests.post(AML_ENDPOINT, json=payload, headers=headers) print(response.json()) Option B: Tool-Based Invocation Expose the ML endpoint as an OpenAPI interface Allow higher-level orchestration layers (such as agents) to invoke it dynamically Both patterns integrate cleanly with Azure App Services, Container Apps, Functions, and Kubernetes-based apps. Operational Considerations Dependency management is ongoing work Model upgrades require redeployment Private networking must be planned early Use managed Foundry models where possible Use BYOM when business or regulatory needs require it Security and Governance by Default BYOM on Azure ML integrates natively with Azure platform controls: Entra ID & managed identity RBAC-based permissions Private networking and VNET isolation Centralized logging and diagnostics This makes BYOM suitable for regulated industries and production‑critical AI workloads. When Should You Use BYOM? BYOM is the right choice when: You need model choice independence You want to deploy open‑source or proprietary LLMs You require enterprise‑grade controls You are building AI APIs, agents, or copilots at scale For experimentation, higher‑level tooling may be faster. For production, BYOM provides the control and durability enterprises require. Conclusion Azure applications increasingly depend on AI, but models should not dictate architecture. With Azure Machine Learning as the execution layer and Azure Apps as the orchestration layer, organizations can: combine managed and custom models Enforce security and compliance Scale AI workloads reliably Avoid platform and vendor lock-in Bring Your Own Model (BYOM) is no longer a niche requirement. It is a foundational pattern for enterprise AI platforms. Azure Machine Learning enables BYOM across open‑source models, fine‑tuned variants, and proprietary LLMs, allowing organizations to innovate without being locked into a single model provider. You build the application. Azure delivers the platform. You own the model. That is the essence of BYOM on Azure.Announcing a flexible, predictable billing model for Azure SRE Agent
Billing for Azure SRE Agent will start on September 1, 2025. Announced at Microsoft Build 2025, Azure SRE Agent is a pre-built AI agent for root cause analysis, uptime improvement, and operational cost reduction. Learn more about the billing model and example scenarios.The Durable Task Scheduler Consumption SKU is now Generally Available
Today, we're excited to announce that the Durable Task Scheduler Consumption SKU has reached General Availability. Developers can now run durable workflows and agents on Azure with pay-per-use pricing, no storage to manage, no capacity to plan, and no idle costs. Just create a scheduler, connect your app, and start orchestrating. Whether you're coordinating AI agent workflows, processing event-driven pipelines, or running background jobs, the Consumption SKU is ready to go. GET STARTED WITH THE DURABLE TASK SCHEDULER CONSUMPTION SKU Since launching the Consumption SKU in public preview last November, we've seen incredible adoption and have incorporated feedback from developers around the world to ensure the GA release is truly production ready. “The Durable Task Scheduler has become a foundational piece of what we call ‘workflows’. It gives us the reliability guarantees we need for processing financial documents and sensitive workflows, while keeping the programming model straightforward. The combination of durable execution, external event correlation, deterministic idempotency, and the local emulator experience has made it a natural fit for our event-driven architecture. We have been delighted with the consumption SKUs cost model for our lower environments.”– Emily Lewis, CarMax What is the Durable Task Scheduler? If you're new to the Durable Task Scheduler, we recommend checking out our previous blog posts for a detailed background: Announcing Limited Early Access of the Durable Task Scheduler Announcing Workflow in Azure Container Apps with the Durable Task Scheduler Announcing Dedicated SKU GA & Consumption SKU Public Preview In brief, the Durable Task Scheduler is a fully managed orchestration backend for durable execution on Azure, meaning your workflows and agent sessions can reliably resume and run to completion, even through process failures, restarts, and scaling events. Whether you’re running workflows or orchestrating durable agents, it handles task scheduling, state persistence, fault tolerance, and built-in monitoring, freeing developers from the operational overhead of managing their own execution engines and storage backends. The Durable Task Scheduler works across Azure compute environments: Azure Functions: Using the Durable Functions extension across all Function App SKUs, including Flex Consumption. Azure Container Apps: Using the Durable Functions or Durable Task SDKs with built-in workflow support and auto-scaling. Any compute: Azure Kubernetes Service, Azure App Service, or any environment where you can run the Durable Task SDKs (.NET, Python, Java, JavaScript). Why choose the Consumption SKU? With the Consumption SKU you’re charged only for actions dispatched, with no minimum commitments or idle costs. There’s no capacity to size or throughput to reserve. Create a scheduler, connect your app, and you’re running. The Consumption SKU is a natural fit for workloads with unpredictable or bursty usage patterns: AI agent orchestration: Multi-step agent workflows that call LLMs, retrieve data, and take actions. Users trigger these on demand, so volume is spiky and pay-per-use avoids idle costs between bursts. Event-driven pipelines: Processing events from queues, webhooks, or streams with reliable orchestration and automatic checkpointing, where volumes spike and dip unpredictably. API-triggered workflows: User signups, form submissions, payment flows, and other request-driven processing where volume varies throughout the day. Distributed transactions: Retries and compensation logic across microservices with durable sagas that survive failures and restarts. What's included in the Consumption SKU at GA The Consumption SKU has been hardened based on feedback and real-world usage during the public preview. Here's what's included at GA: Performance Up to 500 actions per second: Sufficient throughput for a wide range of workloads, with the option to move to the Dedicated SKU for higher-scale scenarios. Up to 30 days of data retention: View and manage orchestration history, debug failures, and audit execution data for up to 30 days. Built-in monitoring dashboard Filter orchestrations by status, drill into execution history, view visual Gantt and sequence charts, and manage orchestrations (pause, resume, terminate, or raise events), all from the dashboard, secured with Role-Based Access Control (RBAC). Identity-based security The Consumption SKU uses Entra ID for authentication and RBAC for authorization. No SAS tokens or access keys to manage, just assign the appropriate role and connect. Get started with the Durable Task Scheduler today The Consumption SKU is available now Generally Available. Provision a scheduler in the Azure portal, connect your app, and start orchestrating. You only pay for what you use. Documentation Getting started Samples Pricing Consumption SKU docs We'd love to hear your feedback. Reach out to us by filing an issue on our GitHub repositoryBuilding the agentic future together at JDConf 2026
JDConf 2026 is just weeks away, and I’m excited to welcome Java developers, architects, and engineering leaders from around the world for two days of learning and connection. Now in its sixth year, JDConf has become a place where the Java community compares notes on their real-world production experience: patterns, tooling, and hard-earned lessons you can take back to your team, while we keep moving the Java systems that run businesses and services forward in the AI era. This year’s program lines up with a shift many of us are seeing first-hand: delivery is getting more intelligent, more automated, and more tightly coupled to the systems and data we already own. Agentic approaches are moving from demos to backlog items, and that raises practical questions: what’s the right architecture, where do you draw trust boundaries, how do you keep secrets safe, and how do you ship without trading reliability for novelty? JDConf is for and by the people who build and manage the mission-critical apps powering organizations worldwide. Across three regional livestreams, you’ll hear from open source and enterprise practitioners who are making the same tradeoffs you are—velocity vs. safety, modernization vs. continuity, experimentation vs. operational excellence. Expect sessions that go beyond “what” and get into “how”: design choices, integration patterns, migration steps, and the guardrails that make AI features safe to run in production. You’ll find several practical themes for shipping Java in the AI era: connecting agents to enterprise systems with clear governance; frameworks and runtimes adapting to AI-native workloads; and how testing and delivery pipelines evolve as automation gets more capable. To make this more concrete, a sampling of sessions would include topics like Secrets of Agentic Memory Management (patterns for short- and long-term memory and safe retrieval), Modernizing a Java App with GitHub Copilot (end-to-end upgrade and migration with AI-powered technologies), and Docker Sandboxes for AI Agents (guardrails for running agent workflows without risking your filesystem or secrets). The goal is to help you adopt what’s new while hardening your long lived codebases. JDConf is built for community learning—free to attend, accessible worldwide, and designed for an interactive live experience in three time zones. You’ll not only get 23 practitioner-led sessions with production-ready guidance but also free on-demand access after the event to re-watch with your whole team. Pro tip: join live and get more value by discussing practical implications and ideas with your peers in the chat. This is where the “how” details and tradeoffs become clearer. JDConf 2026 Keynote Building the Agentic Future Together Rod Johnson, Embabel | Bruno Borges, Microsoft | Ayan Gupta, Microsoft The JDConf 2026 keynote features Rod Johnson, creator of the Spring Framework and founder of Embabel, joined by Bruno Borges and Ayan Gupta to explore where the Java ecosystem is headed in the agentic era. Expect a practitioner-level discussion on how frameworks like Spring continue to evolve, how MCP is changing the way agents interact with enterprise systems, and what Java developers should be paying attention to right now. Register. Attend. Earn. Register for JDConf 2026 to earn Microsoft Rewards points, which you can use for gift cards, sweepstakes entries, and more. Earn 1,000 points simply by signing up. When you register for any regional JDConf 2026 event with your Microsoft account, you'll automatically receive these points. Get 5,000 additional points for attending live (limited to the first 300 attendees per stream). On the day of your regional event, check in through the Reactor page or your email confirmation link to qualify. Disclaimer: Points are added to your Microsoft account within 60 days after the event. Must register with a Microsoft account email. Up to 10,000 developers eligible. Points will be applied upon registration and attendance and will not be counted multiple times for registering or attending at different events. Terms | Privacy JDConf 2026 Regional Live Streams Americas – April 8, 8:30 AM – 12:30 PM PDT (UTC -7) Bruno Borges hosts the Americas stream, discussing practical agentic Java topics like memory management, multi-agent system design, LLM integration, modernization with AI, and dependency security. Experts from Redis, IBM, Hammerspace, HeroDevs, AI Collective, Tekskills, and Microsoft share their insights. Register for Americas → Asia-Pacific – April 9, 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM SGT (UTC +8) Brian Benz and Ayan Gupta co-host the APAC stream, highlighting Java frameworks and practices for agentic delivery. Topics include Spring AI, multi-agent orchestration, spec-driven development, scalable DevOps, and legacy modernization, with speakers from Broadcom, Alibaba, CERN, MHP (A Porsche Company), and Microsoft. Register for Asia-Pacific → Europe, Middle East and Africa – April 9, 9:00 AM – 12:30 PM GMT (UTC +0) The EMEA stream, hosted by Sandra Ahlgrimm, will address the implementation of agentic Java in production environments. Topics include self-improving systems utilizing Spring AI, Docker sandboxes for agent workflow management, Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) pipelines, modernization initiatives from a national tax authority, and AI-driven CI/CD enhancements. Presentations will feature experts from Broadcom, Docker, Elastic, Azul Systems, IBM, Team Rockstars IT, and Microsoft. Register for EMEA → Make It Interactive: Join Live Come prepared with an actual challenge you’re facing, whether you’re modernizing a legacy application, connecting agents to internal APIs, or refining CI/CD processes. Test your strategies by participating in live chats and Q&As with presenters and fellow professionals. If you’re attending with your team, schedule a debrief after the live stream to discuss how to quickly use key takeaways and insights in your pilots and projects. Learning Resources Java and AI for Beginners Video Series: Practical, episode-based walkthroughs on MCP, GenAI integration, and building AI-powered apps from scratch. Modernize Java Apps Guide: Step-by-step guide using GitHub Copilot agent mode for legacy Java project upgrades, automated fixes, and cloud-ready migrations. AI Agents for Java Webinar: Embedding AI Agent capabilities into Java applications using Microsoft Foundry, from project setup to production deployment. Java Practitioner’s Guide: Learning plan for deploying, managing, and optimizing Java applications on Azure using modern cloud-native approaches. Register Now JDConf 2026 is a free global event for Java teams. Join live to ask questions, connect, and gain practical patterns. All 23 sessions will be available on-demand. Register now to earn Microsoft Rewards points for attending. Register at JDConf.com
