Microsoft Partner Code of Conduct Update
Microsoft is updating the Partner Code of Conduct (PCoC) to clarify expectations for partner compliance, effective August 1, 2026. What’s new The following provision is being added to the Governance section of the PCoC: Microsoft Partners may be required to participate in, and successfully complete anti-corruption and remediation programs related to this Partner Code of Conduct or other Microsoft partner programs or offers. Such remediation programs may address Partners’ business controls, training, and assistance obligations. These programs and trainings are separate and additional to any standard compliance training required as part of the Partner Code of Conduct. Microsoft Partners will fully cooperate with assigned anti-corruption and remediation programs, which may include, but are not limited to, Remediation Standard, Remediation Extended, and MCAPS Finance Partner Compliance programs, or successor programs. What this means for partners No immediate action is required; this update is for awareness and clarification. As a reminder, Partners are expected to: Maintain effective compliance controls Cooperate with Microsoft during investigations Participate in assigned remediation programs whenrequired Why this matters This update clarifies how Microsoft and partners will continue to work together to address compliance gaps and strengthen trust, transparency, and accountability across the partner ecosystem. Review the updated Partner Code of Conduct terms. You may also access the current Partner Code of Conduct until the new terms go into effect on August 1, 2026.Partner Blog | Registration is open for MCAPS Start for Partners
Customers are rapidly moving toward Frontier Transformation—the shift to AI and agents embedded as a repeatable, governed operating capability—and they are seeking your expertise to make it real. Customers need Microsoft partners who can turn AI experimentation into scalable ways of working. Partners best positioned for success in FY27 are those with a differentiated capability to operationalize AI with trust and intelligence as the foundation. In April, we shared an early look at the plan for MCAPS Start for Partners, our annual kickoff to our fiscal year, enabling all of us to have a strong start to the year. I am pleased to share that registration for the event is now open. Secure your spot now and register for MCAPS Start for Partners. This is your opportunity to get a fast start to FY27, with the new tools, resources, and investments to support successful growth in the year ahead. MCAPS Start for Partners is designed to create clarity on Microsoft’s priorities, innovation, and investments for FY27, so you can convert this into practice growth, co-sell, and customer wins. It’s the annual moment to align early with Microsoft investments and go-to-market motions so your teams can focus, prioritize, and execute against what will shape customer conversations throughout the year. Join us virtually on Wednesday, July 22, 2026. Bring the leaders who will turn priorities into outcomes across your sales, presales, delivery, and marketing teams. Continue reading hereAzure 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!GPT-5 in Azure AI Foundry: The future of AI apps and agents starts here
OpenAI’s GPT-5 is available today in Azure AI Foundry. GPT-5 adds advanced capabilities to support agentic workflows, complex code synthesis, and safer, more flexible integrations. Ideal for: Unified reasoning + chat for end-to-end problem solving Agentic task mastery with multi-step tool use and auditable decisions, Frontier coding with minimal prompting Developer controls for depth, speed, verbosity Free-form function calling (no rigid JSON schemas) Safer completions for sensitive prompts Learn more here!The latest Azure AI Foundry innovations help you differentiate your business
Discover how you can push the envelope of innovation for your customers with the latest in Azure AI Foundry. Combine Microsoft Fabric and Azure AI Foundry's capabilities to create custom AI agents with domain expertise Ensure consistent AI performance for your customers with PTU Spillover Automate workflows to reshape business processes with the Responses API and Computer-Using Agent (CUA) Improve AI project efficiency with NVIDIA NIM Microservices and AgentIQ Toolkit Explore how accessibility and inclusivity are integrated into AI development. Plus, don't miss the new MIT Technology Review Insights Report on AI customization. Check out the full blog post to dive deeper into these exciting updates and see how they can benefit your business!Microsoft Ignite 2024: Empowering partners to drive growth and innovation
Today marked the start of Microsoft Ignite, our biggest customer and partner event of the year, showcasing the latest innovation, product updates, and breakthroughs across our business. Partners from around the world joined us to learn how Microsoft is investing in partner success and creating new opportunities to accelerate growth and help customers transform their businesses with AI. Today, we are announcing upwards of 80 new products and features, including new capabilities in Microsoft 365 Copilot, additions to the Copilot + AI stack and new Copilot+ devices offerings. Underpinning each of these innovations is our commitment to security. Microsoft 365 Copilot – Microsoft 365 Copilot is your AI assistant for work, and we have seen the momentum grow as more organizations are moving to Copilot and using it successfully to increase employee productivity. Microsoft is continuing to supercharge productivity with new capabilities in Microsoft 365 Copilot designed to help simplify the workday. Copilot + AI Stack – The Copilot stack empowers users to build more ambitious products by leveraging advanced technology at each layer of the stack. Today we’re announcing Azure AI Foundry, where organizations design, customize, and manage the next generation of AI apps and agents at scale. Azure AI Foundry brings together our wide collection of foundation, open, industry, and task models, AI tooling, and safety and monitoring solutions into a single experience. Foundry helps businesses efficiently and cost-effectively design and scale their AI applications while empowering IT pros to manage AI safety, reliability, and performance. Security – Since launching our Secure Future Initiative (SFI) one year ago, we have made security the No. 1 job of every employee at Microsoft, dedicated 34,000 engineers to this focus and, at Ignite, we are announcing innovations that are rooted in our SFI principles: secure by design, secure by default, and secure operations. These are just some of the over 200 announcements made at Microsoft Ignite today. For the full list be sure to check out the Microsoft Ignite blog and the event Book of News. Continue reading here
