Microsoft Cloud – Sick Gaming

Posted on December 15, 2022 by — Leave a comment

Microsoft announces the phased rollout of the EU Data Boundary for the Microsoft Cloud begins Jan. 1

In today’s global economy, commercial and public sector customers continue to look for ways to advance their goals, protect their data and scale for improved efficiencies. To support these changing requirements, Microsoft is committed to providing trusted cloud services that are designed to take advantage of the full power of the public cloud while respecting European values and sovereignty needs.

Today, we are announcing that, on January 1, 2023, Microsoft will begin a phased rollout of our EU Data Boundary solution to public sector and commercial customers in the European Union (EU) and the European Free Trade Association (EFTA).

Microsoft’s on-going commitment to Europe

Microsoft remains deeply committed to supporting European digital needs and has adopted five European Cloud Principles that guide our cloud business across Europe. Microsoft offers data residency and proximity in more locations than any other cloud provider, enabling residency options for the entire Microsoft Cloud suite of online services, including Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, Power Platform and Azure.

We provide Microsoft Cloud services to customers in nearly every country around the world. To support the requirements of customers across the EU and EFTA, we have opened and are constructing datacenters in more than 17 datacenter regions in Europe. Since 2020, we have announced plans to build nine new datacenter regions and during the past two years have made investments exceeding $12 billion, making Microsoft one of the largest sources of capital investment in Europe’s digital future.

Beginning the phased rollout of the EU Data Boundary for the Microsoft Cloud

Beginning on January 1, 2023, Microsoft will offer customers the ability to store and process their customer data within the EU Data Boundary for Microsoft 365, Azure, Power Platform and Dynamics 365 services. With this release, Microsoft expands on existing local storage and processing commitments, greatly reducing data flows out of Europe and building on our industry-leading data residency solutions.

In coming phases of the EU Data Boundary, Microsoft will expand the EU Data Boundary solution to include the storage and processing of additional categories of personal data, including data provided when receiving technical support.

Microsoft’s cloud services already comply with or exceed EU requirements, and the EU Data Boundary will further enable public sector and commercial customers in the EU and the EFTA to have their data processed and stored within the region. In addition, with the rollout of the EU Data Boundary, Microsoft will publish new data flow documentation on the new EU Data Boundary Trust Center webpage to provide transparent data insights for customers whose services will be included in the boundary.

The Microsoft EU Data Boundary is designed to build on our current residency solutions and offer enhanced control over data and increased transparency. In addition to the EU Data Boundary, Microsoft will continue to offer a wide spectrum of solutions that build on our long-standing commitments to support varied sovereignty needs, from our existing data residency capabilities in Azure, Dynamics, and Power Platform, to the coming Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty, to Microsoft 365’s newly expanded data residency.

With Microsoft, commercial and public sector customers have the choice and flexibility they need to enjoy hyperscale products at the cutting edge of innovation while also meeting regulatory requirements and industry-specific standards.

Providing a future roadmap and new levels of transparency documentation

The EU Data Boundary is an industry-leading data residency solution. Based on customer feedback and insights, as well as learnings gained over the past year of developing the boundary, we have adjusted the timeline for the localization of additional personal data categories and data provided when receiving technical support. To ensure that we continue to deliver a world-class solution that meets the overall quality, stability, and security expectations of customers, Microsoft will deliver on-going enhancements to the boundary in phases. To assist customers with planning, we have published a detailed roadmap for our EU Data Boundary available on our Trust Center.

As part of our first phase of the EU Data Boundary rollout beginning January 1, 2023, Microsoft will publish detailed documentation on our Boundary commitments. Transparency documentation will be published initially in English and will also be made available in additional languages.

Documentation will be updated continually as Microsoft rolls out additional phases of the EU Data Boundary and will include details around services that may continue to require limited transfers of customer data outside of the EU to maintain the security and reliability of the service.

These limited data transfers ensure that EU customers continue to receive the full benefits of global hyperscale cloud computing while enjoying industry-leading data management capabilities. The transparency documentation, including data flow descriptions, will be available in the new EU Data Boundary Trust Center.

We look forward to continuing to partner with customers in Europe and will continue to do our best to empower their success in a dynamic and changing economic, social, and regulatory environment.

Posted on December 15, 2022 by — Leave a comment

How Microsoft datacenter operations prepare for energy issues

The war in Ukraine and the resultant shortage of natural gas has forced the European Union (EU) and European countries to proactively prepare for the possibility of more volatile energy supplies—both this winter and beyond. Microsoft is working with customers, governments, and other stakeholders throughout the region to bring clarity, continuity, and compliance in the face of possible energy-saving strategies at the local and national level. In solidarity with Europe, where even essential services are likely to be asked to find energy savings, we have validated plans and contingencies in place to responsibly reduce energy use in our operations across Europe, and we will do so in a way that minimizes risk to customer workloads running in the Microsoft Cloud.

We want to share some of the contingencies and mitigations that our teams have put in place to responsibly operate our cloud services.

Supporting grid stability by responsibly managing our energy consumption

The power that is consumed by Microsoft from the utilities is primarily used to power our network and servers, cooling systems, and other datacenter operations. We have contingency plans to contribute to energy grid stability, while working to ensure minimal disruption to our customers and their workloads, including:

The scale and distribution of the Microsoft datacenters gives us the ability to reposition non-regional platform as a service (PaaS) services, internal infrastructure, and many of our internal non-customer research and development (R&D) workloads to other nearby regions, while still meeting our data residency and EU Data Boundary commitments.
Actively working with local governments and large organizations to closely monitor and respond to power consumption to ensure grid stability and minimal disruption to our customers’ critical workloads. We are working with local utility providers to ensure our systems are ready for a range of circumstances.
Our datacenter regions are planned and built to withstand grid emergencies. When needed, we quickly transition to backup power sources to reduce impact on the grid without impacting customer workloads.

Resilient infrastructure investment

Microsoft is responsible for providing our customers with a resilient foundation in the Microsoft Cloud—in how it is designed, operated, and monitored to ensure availability. We make considerable investments in the platform itself—physical things like our datacenters, as well as software things like our deployment and maintenance processes.

We strive to provide our cloud-using customers with “five-nines” of service availability, meaning that the datacenter is operational 99.999 percent of the time. However, knowing that service interruptions and failures happen for a myriad of reasons, we build systems designed with failure in mind.

We have Azure Availability Zones (AZs) in every country in which we operate datacenter regions. AZ’s are comprised of a minimum of three zone locations, each with independent power, cooling and networking, allowing customers to spread their infrastructure and applications across discrete and dispersed datacenters for added resiliency and availability.

Battery backup and backup generators are an additional resiliency capability we implement and are utilized during power grid outages and other service interruptions so we can meet service levels and operational reliability. We have contracted access to additional fuel supplies to maintain generator operations, and we also hold critical spares to maintain generator health. We are ready to use backup generators across Europe, when necessary, to keep our services running in case of a serious grid emergency.

Across our global infrastructure, it’s not unusual for us to work with a heightened operational awareness, due to external factors. For instance, severe winter weather events in Texas in 2021 caused substantial pressure on the Texas energy grid. Microsoft was able to remove its San Antonio datacenter from using grid power. Although Microsoft’s onsite substations were designed with redundancy, we were able to quickly transition to our tertiary redundant systems—generators. These systems kept the datacenters running, with zero impact to our cloud customers, while the utility grid could ensure residential homes stayed warm. During this event, we maintained 100 percent uptime for our customers, while removing our workloads from the grid.

Resiliency recommendations for cloud architectures

This is a challenging time for organizations monitoring the growing energy concerns in Europe. We are providing important infrastructure for the communities where we operate, and our customers are counting on us to provide reliable cloud services to run their critical workloads. We recognize the importance of continuity of service for our customers, including those providing essential services: health care providers, police and emergency responders, financial institutions, manufacturers of critical supplies, grocery stores and health agencies. Organizations wondering what more they can do to improve the reliability of their applications, or wondering how they can reduce their own energy consumption, can consider the following:

Customers who have availed themselves of high availability tools, including geo-redundancy, should be unaffected by impacts to a single datacenter region. For software as a service (SaaS) services like Microsoft 365, Microsoft Dynamics 365, and Microsoft Power Platform, the business continuity and resiliency are managed by Microsoft. For Microsoft Azure, customers should always consider designing their Azure workloads with high availability in mind.
We always encourage customers to have a Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery (BCDR) plan in place as part of the Microsoft Well-Architected Framework, which you can read more about. Customers who want to proactively migrate their Azure resources from one region to another can do so at any time. Find out how.
On-premises customers can reduce their own energy consumption by moving their applications, workloads, and databases to the cloud. The Microsoft Cloud can be up to 93 percent more energy efficient than traditional enterprise datacenters, depending on the specific comparison being made. Discover more here. Start your sustainability journey today.
Energy use in our datacenters is driven by customer use. Customers can play a part in reducing energy consumption by following green software development guidelines, including shutting down unused server instances, and sustainable application design. Further information available here.

We continue to improve the energy efficiency of our datacenters, in our ongoing commitment to make our global infrastructure more sustainable and efficient. As countries and energy providers consider options to reduce their consumption of electricity in the event of an energy capacity shortage, we are working with grid operators on this evolving situation. With the scale, expertise, and partnerships that we operate, we are confident that our risk mitigation activities will offset any potential disruption to our customers running their critical workloads in the cloud.

Posted on November 21, 2022 by — Leave a comment

‘Moments of truth’: Belgian company HB Antwerp is using blockchain to track each diamond’s story

Simply disrupting the traditional diamond supply chain isn’t quite what the founders of Belgian company HB Antwerp are aiming to do. They want a revolution.

The company launched in 2020 with the goal of using technology to bring visibility to the traditionally opaque diamond industry. Its founders hope to establish a new standard for diamonds by providing an end-to-end picture of each stone’s trajectory, from mine to consumer, while ensuring greater equity for diamonds’ countries of origin.

Those efforts center on using blockchain technology and the Microsoft Cloud to create a digital ledger of each diamond’s story — starting with where the stone came from, down to the precise excavation location, and following it as it is sorted, analyzed, transformed from rough stone to sparkling diamond and finally, delivered to the consumer.

Close-up photo of a man working in a diamond processing facility. — HB Antwerp’s mission is focused on empowering local communities to benefit from the diamond industry and have a greater stake in its future.

Those “moments of truth,” as HB Antwerp calls them, will enable diamond-mining countries to see how much value their stones generate, and conscious-minded buyers to know where their diamonds come from. They also create an enormous amount of data — over 3,000 verification points for each stone.

“The main challenge was that it’s never been done before,” says Shai de-Toledo, one of HB Antwerp’s founders.

Realizing the need for a partner capable of scaling the solution to any country, HB Antwerp turned to Microsoft. The companies worked together to develop a blockchain ledger built on Microsoft Azure and an enterprise resource planning system using Microsoft Dynamics 365. Data from each diamond is stored in a proprietary IoT device, essentially a minivault that can’t be opened without documenting that action in the ledger. (See a demo of HB Antwerp’s IoT capsule.)

Photo of smiling young woman working at a diamond processing facility. — The HB Antwerp Innovation Lab opened in Botswana in 2021 to train graduate students, particularly women, for careers in its facility there.

The data is then uploaded to Power BI, Microsoft’s data visualization platform, to provide governments and mining companies with a real-time view of their diamonds’ value appreciation. The goal, de-Toledo says, is to make information about each diamond available to consumers through a link to the ledger.

“We are trying to package this entire journey and deliver it to the consumer in a way that will create an environment that others find it very difficult to compete with,” he says. “Having a ledger and a representation of the journey means that for the first time, consumers can ask themselves, ‘Where did the diamond come from? What was its impact? Which people benefited from it?’”

The traditional diamond supply chain, de-Toledo says, has commodified diamonds and diluted their value, with many players involved and little benefit flowing to the countries and people who produce the diamonds.

“For more than a century, the diamond industry has made billions from obfuscating every stone’s journey,” he says. “Where it’s from, who added value to it, how the value is — or isn’t — benefitting local communities, or even what a fair price should be for consumers. We feel it’s done so much harm that simply ‘disrupting’ feels like an evolution. This is a revolution.”

Outdoor group shot of HB Antwerp employees and diamond industry workers in Botswana. — HB Antwerp’s approach to purchasing diamonds has resulted in 40% higher royalties to the Botswana government over the past two years.

A ‘seismic shift’ for Botswana

Integral to HB Antwerp’s mission is empowering local communities to benefit from the diamond industry and have a greater stake in its future. In Botswana, that has meant investing in the country, ensuring a fairer price for its diamonds and creating new opportunities for its people. The HB Antwerp Innovation Lab opened in Botswana in 2021 to train engineering and technology graduate students, particularly women, for careers in its facility there. Additionally, HB Antwerp will soon open an academy in Botswana to train local diamond polishers.

In 2020, HB Antwerp began implementing its new ecosystem under a partnership with the Lucara Diamond Corporation at its Karowe mine in Botswana. HB Antwerp is purchasing diamonds from the mine based on their value as polished stones, rather than the standard practice of paying for rough product. That has resulted in 40% higher diamond royalties to the Botswana government over the past two years, according to HB Antwerp.

Botswana President Mokgweetsi Masisi characterized the new approach as a “seismic shift” for the country. “I can tell you we do not want to revert to the standard we had,” he says.

Botswana President Mokgweetsi Masisi with Teresa Hutson, vice president of Microsoft’s Tech and Corporate Responsibility Group. — Botswana President Mokgweetsi Masisi, left, with Teresa Hutson, vice president of Microsoft’s Tech and Corporate Responsibility Group, during a U.N. General Assembly event.

At a U.N. General Assembly event in September, Masisi said he thinks HB Antwerp’s approach could be used by other African countries and can help meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by U.N. member states.

“We want to go out and really market this,” he said. “We want to see the relationship between African governments and those who they partner with fundamentally change. There’s no reason to think we’re going to attain the SDGs with (current) models. It just won’t work.”

Ultimately, says HB Antwerp co-founder Rafael Papismedov, the goal is to provide knowledge and training that will enable Botswana and other African countries to have greater ownership over their natural resources and grow their economies.

“We believe the future of this industry is to transform the diamond in the country of origin,” he says. “This mineral belongs to the people, and it’s the people that will be involved in every step of it.”

Watch additional HB Antwerp videos and learn more about their story by visiting www.microsoft.com/industrysolutions/HBAntwerp.

Posted on October 26, 2022 by — Leave a comment

’Critical to our modern society’: How datacenters power everyday necessities

In Berlin, a mother chats with her child’s doctor via a computer screen. In a Paris shop, the grocery shelves are stocked and more supplies are on the way. In Amsterdam, a student makes an online rent payment. In Romania, an ambulance is dispatched to a car accident.

All those moments – along with countless conveniences that pack daily life – nowadays happen with the help of datacenters. Purposely nondescript, these warehouses contain tens of thousands of interconnected computer servers plus the equipment needed to ensure the servers are always running, always available.

Simply put, they are the physical infrastructure behind cloud computing. And across Europe, Microsoft datacenters are operating around the clock to support a wide spectrum of critical services, from the life-saving work of doctors and first responders to essential services like groceries and online banking. At the same time, datacenters also empower everyday necessities like food deliveries, remote work and video calls to family.

As Europeans brace for the possibility of a wintertime energy crisis, market researchers and energy consultants are calling datacenters critical enablers of modern society – including how they foster hybrid work schedules that reduce travel and allow office buildings to use less heat and electricity.

Despite the role datacenters play in so many aspects of people’s lives, most people don’t give them a second thought.

“Without datacenter infrastructure, which is the invisible infrastructure, will you still be able to do the things you need for working, resting and playing? Unless you’re off grid, the answer is no, you’re not going to be able to do any of those things,” says Rahiel Nasir, an associate research director at the market research firm IDC. He is based in the U.K.

“They are critical to our modern society,” adds Nasir, a member of IDC’s European cloud and cloud data management research programs.

Echoing those words, energy advisers Baringa labeled datacenters as “essential for modern society” – the top finding of a July report published by the U.K.-based consultancy.

From health care to grocery shopping, from online schools to online banking, it’s difficult to think of many corners of life that aren’t dependent on cloud services hosted in datacenters. Microsoft Azure and Microsoft Teams are products that rely on datacenters.

In medicine, hundreds of hospitals and clinics in Europe rely on Azure’s cloud capabilities to track patient records, schedule surgeries and engage with patients via telehealth systems. A German software company created an Azure-based solution that has helped more than 600 European health care facilities manage the work schedules of doctors, nurses and other staff.

A hospital in the Czech Republic uses Azure IoT to help monitor medication storage. In Poland, a surgeon uses augmented reality to precisely perform a procedure. And Azure hosts the public health records and the robotic medicine dispensing system for a hospital in Malta.

For urgent medical matters, Microsoft datacenters support emergency dispatch services across Europe, including 112-call systems and the mapping platforms that help route emergency vehicles to people in need and to the nearest hospitals.

In the world of money, some European financial services run their risk assessment programs in Azure, helping them make smarter decisions about where and how to invest. The cloud also enables financial trading systems, a core driver of economic markets.

In the stores, some European retailers rely on Microsoft Teams and its cloud-based collaboration functions to communicate with employees in the aisles or checkout lanes. At the back end, datacenters allow retail managers to track stock.

And to keep the lights on in those stores as well as in thousands of other businesses, hospitals and private homes, European utility providers trust datacenters to carry the critical workloads that help them manage electrical grids.

“Just looking across that list of industries and all the enablement they provide, datacenters are critical,” says Corey Sanders, corporate vice president of Microsoft cloud for industry and global expansion.

“Across almost every industry – manufacturing, transportation, even hospitality – there is some aspect of dependency, whether it be legacy services running in the cloud or modern digital transformation capabilities that have been invented in the cloud,” Sanders says.

Posted on September 27, 2022 by — Leave a comment

The NBA launches a first-of-its-kind new app experience for fans, driven by the power of data

More than two years ago, the NBA set out to transform the way fans engage with the league and its teams and players. Their vision was to offer a truly personalized experience – where each fan’s interests would drive the content they receive.

On Tuesday, the NBA announced that their vision had become a reality earlier this month with the reimagined NBA App, powered by a new integrated digital platform built in partnership with Microsoft, the league’s cloud and AI partner.

A portrait of Chris Benyarko, NBA executive vice president of direct to consumer. — Chris Benyarko.

“What makes this app unique in the sports world is that it’s both a deeply personalized experience and an all-in-one destination,” says Chris Benyarko, NBA executive vice president of direct to consumer. “We think this platform makes it easy to be an NBA fan. It allows people to immerse themselves in what’s happening with the league. And there is much more to come.”

A personalized app with a global footprint

Delivering a personalized experience is a tall order considering the league has a social media community of more than 2.1 billion people globally across league, team and player accounts. There are fans on every continent in every time zone speaking every language, and each person might prefer a particular team, player or aspect of the game.

“NBA fans are global, they’re dynamic, they’re diverse,” says Benyarko. “It’s vital to establish a direct relationship with our fans, so we’re in a position to make this app a resource that speaks to all things NBA and all things basketball.”

The NBA vision for the next-gen fan experience was crystal clear but building it would be complex. Enter the Microsoft Cloud.

According to Ken DeGennaro, senior vice president of media operations and technology for the NBA, Microsoft stood out with the ability to provide a complete platform to aggregate data and then act on it using advanced AI and machine learning. Microsoft’s own engineers and vast network of partners also meant the NBA could tap into the resources and expertise needed to bring its vision to life.

Ken DeGennaro.

“We’re a basketball league,” says DeGennaro. “We don’t need to reinvent what companies in the tech and broadcast industry already do so well. We’re focused on creating a differentiated basketball experience [for our fans]. Microsoft offered the Azure platform, the capabilities, and partners with deep expertise to help us put it all together.”

A broadcast platform for now and the future

Like all personalized digital experiences, the new NBA App is driven by data, but those deep data services depend on the fundamentals of handling the content. Just broadcasting a single game takes massive effort from many touchpoints, hands and voices. Other content types come at different velocities and levels of creative overhead. Some clips are true craft pieces that are voiced over, reviewed, edited and finalized. Others are served up as they happen.

The ability to scale and handle such a massive flow of content and data across multiple time zones is a difficult challenge. But for the NBA, it’s table stakes.

“The ability of Azure to receive very high-quality feeds is paramount for us as stewards of the game and the fan experience,” says DeGennaro. “Microsoft has a cloud tailor-made and ready to deliver these streaming services. Those fundamentals are things that have been enabled via Azure and its partner network for the NBA to deliver the best experience to fans.”

A massive data challenge and a huge opportunity

A “massive flow of content” is no understatement. The league wanted to be able to utilize fan insights to personalize their experiences and incorporate data about the game itself and everything that’s happened over decades of NBA play. This includes a treasure trove of live and historical content, statistics, game strategies and a host of other aspects.

“Combining data from the game with insights from fans will allow us to build engaging content and deliver experiences you can’t get anywhere else,” DeGennaro says. “It also allows the system itself to continually learn about basketball and improve over time.”

Those fan experiences take several forms, from how people watch the game to surfacing deep statistical insights. Machine learning creates a flywheel that gains momentum to deliver more insight into what fans see, how they interact with the applications and their behaviors and reactions to the content.

Looking to the future, the ability to extend into new capabilities such as augmented reality, virtual reality, and other technologies will ensure the NBA’s official app continues to evolve. These technologies could allow the NBA to tailor live game broadcasts and modify the game experience. For example, giving fans the ability to use different viewing angles, or different commentators, or offering animations of the game in real-time, such as a first-person view of the way LeBron James sees a play breakdown as he brings the ball up the court.

“We like to experiment with everything, and we feel like we have a good foundation to do that,” says DeGennaro. “We’ve always thought of this launch as day zero. Beyond the things that we’re launching now, we have more than a few things in the lab. In order for that to be possible, the underlying technology platform needs to exist, and that is Azure, that’s Microsoft.”

The NBA and Microsoft are committed to wowing fans with a product that truly stretches the boundaries of basketball and technology.

Photos courtesy of the NBA.

Posted on August 31, 2022 by — Leave a comment

Microsoft opens first global datacenter region in Qatar

The new cloud datacenter region launches with Microsoft Azure and Microsoft 365, giving organizations access to hundreds of scalable, highly available and resilient cloud services.

Today, Microsoft announced the launch of its new datacenter region in Qatar, marking a major milestone for Microsoft as the first hyperscale cloud provider to deliver enterprise-grade services in the country. The new world-class datacenters are open for business with Microsoft Azure and Microsoft 365 available today.

The continued investment is in response to Qatar’s growing demand for high performance computing, and fast and reliable access to Microsoft services. The new datacenter region will play a pivotal role in providing access to scalable, highly available, and resilient cloud services to accelerate the digital transformation and advance intelligent cloud adoption of businesses, customers, and partners across Qatar.

Speaking at the opening ceremony, H.E. Mr. Mohammed bin Ali Al Mannai, Minister of Communications and Information Technology, said: The launch of the Data Centre today is considered an important milestone in the process of transforming the State of Qatar into an advanced and pioneering digital center in the Middle East and the world. This journey was inspired by the Qatar National Vision 2030, which aims to establish a diversified and competitive national economy.”

His Excellency continued: “These pioneering projects in the field of digital transformation, communications and information technology would not have been achieved without the ambitions of the country’s wise leadership and its vision to this vital sector, believing in its crucial role in the development of other economic sectors. Legislative and legal regulation of the sector and enhance its attractiveness.

“Microsoft has more datacenter regions than any other cloud provider and today we are proud to deliver the first hyperscale cloud datacenter region to Qatar. This development will increase opportunities for organizations of all sizes and across all sectors to leverage our trusted cloud to innovate, better serve their customers and achieve their business goals – ultimately supporting continued economic growth that benefits all residents.” said Ralph Haupter, President of Microsoft EMEA.

Providing new opportunities for customers and partners

The Qatar cloud datacenter region will drive growth and scale for Microsoft customers and partners in the country. Microsoft customers across multiple industries, including the Ministry of Communication and Information technology, TASMU PLATFORM, the Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy, and many others, have already embraced the Microsoft Cloud to develop digital capabilities and innovate in their industries. Microsoft partners such as EY, Ooredoo, Vodafone, QDS, PWC, ICT, Malomatia, Intel, Mannai, Meeza, Starlink, and Veeam are delivering transformative solutions across the Microsoft Cloud to drive customer success.

Building future ready skills for employability

Earlier this year, Microsoft, in partnership with the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT), launched the National Skilling Program, with the goal to upskill over 50,000 people in Qatar through providing digital skills acquisition programs over the next four years. To date, the program had benefited over 14,000 people.

Microsoft has also established a first-of-its kind Digital Center of Excellence to help bridge the skills gap amongst the IT community and help accelerate digital transformation, in collaboration with leading universities such as MIT xPro, the European Institute of Business Administration (INSEAD) and HEC Paris.

Delivering reliable, trusted, and resilient cloud, securely

Businesses of all sizes and industries can now host their cloud workloads in Microsoft’s Qatar datacenter, taking advantage of enterprise-grade reliability and performance. Customers can begin leveraging Microsoft Azure to develop advanced applications using AI, data and analytics, IoT and hybrid capabilities with advanced digital security and more, as well as Microsoft 365, the world’s productivity cloud that delivers best-of-breed productivity apps delivered seamlessly through cloud services.

With over 100 compliance offerings – the broadest set of compliance offerings and programs of any public cloud provider – the Microsoft cloud significantly empowers customers to meet local compliance and policy requirements. This includes the National Information Assurance Certification issued by the National Cyber Security Agency, which Microsoft received earlier this year.

“With its longstanding history as an early adopter of technology, Qatar has completely embraced cloud solutions and revolutionized entire industries to develop a new, advanced digital economy. Today’s announcement will enable the country to take these groundbreaking innovations to the world, showcase its standing as a leader in digital transformation and cement Qatar’s place as a global hub for innovation,” said Lana Khalaf, Microsoft Country Manager.

To learn more about the Microsoft cloud datacenter region in Qatar, please visit the website.

Posted on June 2, 2022 by — Leave a comment

Accenture, Microsoft and Avanade expand partnership to help organizations tackle their greatest sustainability challenges

NEW YORK, REDMOND, Wash. and SEATTLE; June 2, 2022 – Accenture (NYSE: ACN) and Microsoft, together with their joint venture Avanade, are joining forces to tackle climate change, one of the most critical and urgent challenges for both businesses and people. With an immediate emphasis on delivering solutions to help organizations transform their operations, products, services and value chains to help accelerate the transition to net zero, the three companies will expand their focus to broader environmental, social and governance (ESG) challenges in the future.

The companies are investing in the co-development of innovative solutions—architected and designed at the onset to emit less carbon over their life cycle—and offering advisory services to help businesses reduce carbon emissions, speed the transition to new energy sources, and shrink or even eliminate waste of finite resources such as water, food and raw materials.

With the powerful combination of Accenture Sustainability Services, Avanade’s human-centered digital experience, the Microsoft Cloud and each company’s robust data and artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities, the expanded strategic partnership will address both horizontal and industry-specific sustainability challenges to help drive impact and deliver new value.

“Increasingly, as all stakeholders look to business to move from commitment to action on environmental challenges, companies that embed sustainability across their enterprises can become a powerful force for change,” said Julie Sweet, chair and chief executive officer of Accenture. “Our partnership with Microsoft and Avanade will help organizations find new value at the intersection of technology and sustainability – from embracing green software development principles and sustainable cloud migrations, to digital twin technology adoption – to drive stronger performance and competitiveness, and make progress on their decarbonization goals and their journey to net zero.”

“Operating sustainably has become a source of competitive advantage, enabling organizations to increase efficiency, accelerate growth, and lead with purpose,” said Judson Althoff, executive vice president and chief commercial officer, Microsoft. “By combining our expertise with Accenture and Avanade, we have an opportunity and responsibility to deliver innovative solutions that will empower organizations to achieve their sustainability goals and drive lasting environmental change.”

Through the expanded strategic partnership, the companies will collaborate to extend existing capabilities and develop new joint offerings across four areas:

Digital Manufacturing Transition – Manufacturing organizations need to rapidly establish and scale the digital foundation of individual production sites and factory networks. Joint offerings will help improve asset utilization and deploy business models that enable circularity. They will also apply digital twin technology to help reduce emissions, waste, the consumption of materials, water and other resources in production and operations, and improve transparency across the value chain. The Accenture/UN Global Compact study found that globally, 44% of CEOs say that digital twins will make a significant impact on sustainability in their industry over the next five years
Low Carbon Energy Transition – Seventy-three percent of CEOs told Accenture and UN Global Compact that they feel increased pressure to act on sustainability over the next three years. To do so, businesses need to transform operations across the energy value chain. Joint offerings will help companies in the transition to a net zero economy by connecting and integrating energy infrastructure to develop carbon intelligence, and transform customer offers and business models that can support low carbon energy experiences.
Sustainable IT with Microsoft Azure and Green Software Engineering – Organizations are seeking energy-efficient infrastructure along with greater workload flexibility and business agility. Accenture research shows that shifting from on-premise data centers to the public cloud can reduce an enterprise’s energy usage by 65% and cut carbon emissions by more than 84%. New solutions on Microsoft Azure span strategy development and assessment of current IT infrastructure; architecting and piloting solutions; a carbon aware approach to migration and green software engineering; and continuous improvement and business transformation with low carbon cloud as its foundation.
ESG Measurement, Analytics and Performance with Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability – Facing increasing regulatory and stakeholder demands, organizations need insights at their fingertips to innovate and embed sustainability into the design of new products and services. Joint solutions will focus on providing sustainability intelligence for value chains by helping to break siloes and provide data-led insights so clients can not only record and report sustainability metrics, but—even more importantly—take action. Companies that consistently demonstrate high ESG performance score 2.6x higher on total shareholder return than counterparts, according to Accenture research.

“The world is at an inflection point where organizations are expected to play an active role in addressing sustainability issues,” said Pam Maynard, chief executive officer, Avanade. “Now more than ever, technology is key to accelerating environmental, social and governance goals and enabling organizations to be sustainable through continual change. We’re excited about the opportunity to help leaders leverage the power of people and technology to take practical sustainability actions that make a genuine human impact.”

Josh Matthews, industry analyst from HFS Research, added, “Sustainability technologies and services need ecosystems of partners to refine and scale solutions. They must quickly set the benchmark for others to follow given how far behind most organizations, industries, and governments are in aligning under the global sustainability context of decarbonization and addressing all 17 UN Goals. Ecosystem collaboration, like this one between Accenture, Microsoft and Avanade, will not only help to refine and scale solutions, but also help to solve the data and transparency challenges which organizations frequently cite to us as major barriers to their sustainability journeys.”

This expanded strategic partnership builds on Accenture, Microsoft and Avanade’s current joint sustainability efforts, including their pioneering role in the Green Software Foundation, a non-profit that is building a trusted ecosystem of people, standards, tooling and practices for green software development. Through a joint initiative called Project Amplify, Accenture and Microsoft have also supported dozens of start-ups focused on social impact and sustainability by providing access to emerging technology and expertise to help scale their solutions.

About Accenture
Accenture is a global professional services company with leading capabilities in digital, cloud and security. Combining unmatched experience and specialized skills across more than 40 industries, we offer Strategy and Consulting, Technology and Operations services and Accenture Song—all powered by the world’s largest network of Advanced Technology and Intelligent Operations centers. Our 699,000 people deliver on the promise of technology and human ingenuity every day, serving clients in more than 120 countries. We embrace the power of change to create value and shared success for our clients, people, shareholders, partners and communities. Visit us at accenture.com.

About Microsoft
Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT” @microsoft) enables digital transformation for the era of an intelligent cloud and an intelligent edge. Its mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.

About Avanade
Avanade is the leading provider of innovative digital, cloud and advisory services, industry solutions and design-led experiences across the Microsoft ecosystem. Every day, our 56,000 professionals in 26 countries make a genuine human impact for our clients, their employees and their customers. We have been recognized as Microsoft’s Global SI Partner of the Year more than any other company. With the most Microsoft certifications (60,000+) and 18 (out of 18) Gold-level Microsoft competencies, we are uniquely positioned to help businesses grow and solve their toughest challenges. We are a people first company, committed to providing an inclusive workplace where employees feel comfortable being their authentic selves. As a responsible business, we are building a sustainable world and helping young people from underrepresented communities fulfill their potential.

Majority owned by Accenture, Avanade was founded in 2000 by Accenture LLP and Microsoft Corporation. Learn more at http://www.avanade.com/.

# # #

Contacts:

Hannah Unkefer
Accenture
+1 206 839 2172
[email protected]

Alexander Aizenberg
Accenture
+1 917 452 9878
[email protected]

Microsoft Media Relations
WE Communications for Microsoft
+1 425 638 7777
[email protected]

Claire Booty
Avanade
+447930760031
[email protected]

Posted on May 23, 2022 by — Leave a comment

American Airlines’ move to the cloud lands more connected tech and travel experiences for employees and customers

As air travel and tourism returns to pre-pandemic levels, the commercial aviation industry is ready to welcome travelers back into the air. And digital technology has the potential to help airlines create a smoother travel experience, especially for those who may not have traveled in the past few years.

American Airlines, the world’s largest airline, is one of the first global airlines to recognize and embrace this opportunity. To minimize disruptions in the airport, on the tarmac and throughout the system, American and Microsoft are partnering to streamline operations, better empower team members and enhance customer experiences using the Microsoft Cloud.

Through this partnership, the airline is equipping its frontline workers with access to information and insights that streamline ground operations and make travel a more pleasant experience for customers, as well as applying data and other technologies to enhance business processes.

Improving costs and increasing efficiency

For airlines and customers who are trying to make a connecting flight, minutes count. Together, American and Microsoft are applying the power of AI, machine learning and data analytics to reduce the taxi time for flights, giving connecting customers extra time to make their next flight while also saving thousands of gallons of jet fuel and decreasing CO2 emissions for the American Airlines fleet. Built on Azure, American’s intelligent gating program provides real-time analysis of data points, including routing and runway information to automatically assign the nearest available gate to arriving aircraft.

Gating decisions for American’s 136 gates at Dallas/Fort-Worth International Airport (DFW), for example, have traditionally required more manual involvement from gate planners. Now, the program can look at multiple data points simultaneously for the hundreds of daily arrivals, saving more than a minute of taxi time per flight. That can not only eliminate up to 10 hours of taxi time per day but also 870,000 gallons of jet fuel each year at DFW – equating to a CO2 emissions reduction of more than 2,600 metric tons annually.

Empowering frontline teams

Prior to the pandemic slowdown, technology investments across all industries tended to focus on simplifying customer experiences. In the travel industry, high-visibility customer-facing systems and smartphone apps received significant funding. Meanwhile, frontline systems received less attention, prompting mobile employees without regular access to desktop or laptop computers to rely instead on texting and consumer apps.

In fact, according to a Microsoft Work Trends Index Special Report, one-third of all frontline workers say they do not have the right technological tools to do their job effectively; that number rises to 41 percent for those in non-management positions.

American Airlines is addressing its frontline workers’ technology needs, equipping them with solutions like ConnectMe, a Microsoft Teams-based solution leveraging PowerApps and Azure, which the airline developed in partnership with Microsoft. Using the app, team members can access real-time data from any mobile device. With key arrival, boarding, baggage and gate information now at their fingertips, American’s frontline teams have accelerated aircraft turn times at dozens of airports in the United States.

By empowering its team members with modern technology to streamline communication and coordination, the airline is driving operational efficiency while also creating a more connected, inclusive worker-friendly culture.

Driving innovation

Running the world’s largest airline is no small feat. Through its partnership with Microsoft, American is on track to migrate and centralize its entire portfolio of strategic operational workloads in the cloud. Operations Hub on Azure will connect American’s data warehouse, several legacy applications and other tools in one place, making the airline one of the first to embrace a comprehensive cloud strategy for all areas of its business. The move will allow American to save costs, increase efficiency and scalability, and make progress toward its ambitious sustainability goals.

“With the power of Microsoft Azure, American can innovate and accelerate its technology transformation, giving our team members augmented tools to provide our customers with an enhanced travel experience,” says Leibman.

It’s been rewarding to see how the world’s largest airline has embraced technology to propel innovation, and we’re excited to reach new heights together for years to come.

(Photos courtesy of American Airlines)

Posted on May 18, 2022 by — Leave a comment

American Airlines and Microsoft partnership takes flight to create a smoother travel experience for customers and better technology tools for team members

American Airlines employees load luggage onto an airplane — American Airlines and Microsoft announce partnership to enhance the airline’s operations. Photo courtesy of American Airlines

As summer travel season approaches, companies streamline operations and reimagine team member and traveler experiences with the Microsoft Cloud

FORT WORTH, Texas, and REDMOND, Wash. — May 18, 2022 — American Airlines and Microsoft Corp. are partnering to use technology to create better, more connected experiences for customers and American Airlines team members, supporting the robust operations of the world’s largest airline. As part of the partnership, American will use Microsoft Azure as its preferred cloud platform for its airline applications and key workloads, significantly accelerating its digital transformation and making Microsoft one of the airline’s largest technology partners.

With travel and tourism this year expected to surpass pre-pandemic levels, the companies are preparing for a future where consumers expect their travel experience to mimic the rest of their lives — more connected, more personalized and more on demand than ever.

Through their partnership, American and Microsoft aim to use data and digital technologies to meet customer demands while also streamlining business processes to give American team members the tools that enable a smoother travel experience for consumers. For example, the companies envision a future where every aspect of the customer experience and airline operations will be optimized using advanced analytics and other digital technologies — from enhanced bag tracking and automatic rerouting of flights based on weather conditions to using digital twins to simulate operations at major hubs and proactively adjust to increase efficiencies.

“Reliably operating thousands of flights around the world to take customers to hundreds of destinations is critical to American, which is why the airline has chosen Microsoft’s technology to support our applications,” said American Airlines Chief Information Officer Maya Leibman. “With the power of Microsoft Azure, American can innovate and accelerate its technology transformation, giving our team members augmented tools to provide our customers with an enhanced travel experience.”

“As the airline industry continues to transform, building a digital technology foundation in the cloud will be essential for future resilience,” said Judson Althoff, EVP and chief commercial officer, Microsoft. “Through our partnership, American Airlines is taking a forward-thinking, cloud-first approach to using data, AI and our collaboration platforms to reimagine not only its own operations but the experiences of its employees and customers.”

Already, American and Microsoft are progressing toward innovative and transformational experiences for airline employees and customers.

Using data to streamline operations and reduce travel pain points

When an aircraft lands at American’s largest hub, Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW), reaching the gate quickly is critical to running a smooth operation. American and Microsoft are applying the power of AI, machine learning and data analytics to reduce taxi time, saving thousands of gallons of jet fuel per year and giving connecting customers extra time to make their next flights. Built on Azure, American’s intelligent gating program provides real-time analysis of data points, including routing and runway information, to automatically assign the nearest available gate to arriving aircraft. Previously, gating decisions for American’s 136 gates at DFW required more manual involvement from gate planners. Now, the program can look at multiple data points simultaneously for the hundreds of daily arrivals, saving more than a minute of taxi time per flight. That adds up to 10 hours of reduced taxi time per day, lower fuel usage and decreased CO₂ emissions.

Enhancing frontline collaboration to drive better customer experiences

For a flight to leave on time takes many team members behind the scenes. Every day, maintenance personnel, ground crew, pilots, flight attendants and gate agents work together to ensure that each flight departs on time. Until recently, these team members — who are always on the move and rarely tied to a desk — relied on accessing information via desktop computers or laptops. American and Microsoft created the ConnectMe app, which team members can access from any mobile device via a Microsoft Power Apps-enabled app in Microsoft Teams. With information now at its fingertips, American has accelerated airplane turn times at gates and connected thousands of frontline team members through a single platform.

Creating a cloud platform for the future of airline operations

Running the world’s largest airline is no small feat. Now, through American’s partnership with Microsoft, the airline will migrate and centralize strategic operational workloads — such as its data warehouse and several legacy applications — in one Operations Hub on Azure, becoming one of the first global airlines to embrace a comprehensive cloud strategy for all its business areas. With its Operations Hub on Azure, American plans to save costs, increase efficiency and scalability, and progress toward its ambitious sustainability goals.

In addition to their cloud partnership, the companies are deepening their relationship to support Microsoft employee travel. Through the highly preferred partnership with American, Microsoft employees will receive new, enhanced benefits when they choose American or its alliance partners for their business travel. Furthermore, American and Microsoft may use Microsoft employee feedback to inform future innovations to continue driving a more connected, seamless and personalized travel experience.

About American Airlines Group

To Care for People on Life’s Journey^®. Shares of American Airlines Group Inc. trade on Nasdaq under the ticker symbol AAL, and the company’s stock is included in the S&P 500. Learn more about what’s happening at American by visiting news.aa.com and connect with American on Twitter @AmericanAir and at Facebook.com/AmericanAirlines.

About Microsoft

Microsoft (Nasdaq “MSFT” @microsoft) enables digital transformation for the era of an intelligent cloud and an intelligent edge. Its mission is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.

For more information, press only:

Microsoft Media Relations, WE Communications for Microsoft, (425) 638-7777, [email protected]

Andrea Koos, American Airlines, (817) 247-4748, [email protected]

Note to editors: For more information, news and perspectives from Microsoft, please visit the Microsoft News Center at http://news.microsoft.com. Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of publication but may have changed. For additional assistance, journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or other appropriate contacts listed at https://news.microsoft.com/microsoft-public-relations-contacts.

Posted on December 7, 2020 by — Leave a comment

New datacenter region in Denmark to accelerate country’s green, digital transformation

The investment includes a sustainable datacenter region, powered by 100 percent renewable energy, the ability to store data in Denmark, and a plan to bring digital upskilling to 200,000 Danes by 2024

COPENHAGEN, Denmark – December 7, 2020 – Microsoft Corp. today announced the most significant investment in its 30-year history in Denmark, introducing Denmark as the location for its next sustainable datacenter region and a comprehensive skilling commitment for an estimated 200,000 Danes by 2024. Powered by 100 percent renewable energy, the datacenter region will provide Danish customers of all sizes faster access to the Microsoft Cloud, world-class security and the ability to store data at rest in the country.

These announcements are part of #DigitalLeapDenmark, a commitment to the country’s green digital future. This plan represents the next step in Microsoft’s longstanding commitment to help the country accelerate public sector digitization, fuel digital innovation to support growth of Danish enterprises, and apply technology to help create a greener future. Today, Microsoft employs more than a thousand people in the country and has recently invested in a quantum computing research lab in collaboration with the University of Copenhagen and the Technical University of Denmark.

“This is a proud day for Microsoft in Denmark,” said Brad Smith, President, Microsoft. “Building a hyper-scale datacenter in Denmark means we’ll store Danish data in Denmark, make computing more accessible at even faster speeds, secure data with our world-class security, protect data with Danish privacy laws, and do more to provide to the people of Denmark our best digital skills training. This investment reflects our deep appreciation of Denmark’s green and digital leadership globally and our commitment to its future.”

“The Government’s ambition is for Denmark to emerge from COVID-19 even greener, stronger and more socially just. We have initiated a green recovery of the Danish economy and launched a new strategy for green public procurement, contributing towards our ambitious climate targets. Today, datacenters and IT solutions represent a considerable part of carbon emissions from public procurement in Denmark, so we see a big potential to reduce our climate footprint. I’m pleased to see that businesses are embracing the government’s climate ambitions and taking responsibility for creating a green, digital future. This underlines Denmark’s leading position in both the green and digital transition,” said Nicolai Wammen, Danish Minister of Finance.

Investing in Denmark to accelerate growth and innovation

The Microsoft Cloud enables innovation through the latest technology advancements including: Microsoft Azure, an ever-expanding set of cloud services that offers computing, networking, databases, analytics, AI and Internet of Things (IoT) services; Microsoft 365, the world’s productivity cloud that delivers best-of-breed productivity apps and security solutions; and Dynamics 365 and Power Platform, which enable organizations to rapidly build and manage critical enterprise business solutions at scale with intelligent business applications. The Danish datacenter region will provide customers with access to low-latency, enterprise-grade cloud services with world-class data security and compliance. In addition, the new region will deliver Azure Availability Zones, to provide additional tolerance and high availability for applications.

Hundreds of Danish enterprises and public organizations such as Arla Foods, Carlsberg, Coop, Danfoss, Energinet, Grundfos, Pandora, Maersk, Saxo Bank, Simcorp, and The Danish Ministry of Taxation already rely on the Microsoft Cloud to power critical business applications, new customer experiences and innovative data solutions.

“Microsoft is a strategic business partner and the establishment of a Danish data center region creates the basis for us to be able to use solutions based on cloud to an even greater extent. Our business is based on stable, secure and compliant operation to the financial sector, and JN Data’s task is to connect the existing systems with cloud solutions so that JN Data’s community can take full advantage of cloud. By doing so our customers achieve a higher speed of development, which they can benefit from when developing solutions for their customers and ultimately for the banks’ customers,” said Søren Lindgaard, CEO, JN Data.

The Danish datacenter region also provides new opportunities for the partner ecosystem, that build innovative solutions on the Microsoft Cloud. Microsoft in Denmark works with more than 2000 partners, including Accenture, Atea, KMD, Netcompany, NNIT, Proactive, Systematic, and Venzo, to help danish customers accelerate their digital transformation. According to IDC, $1 of Microsoft cloud revenue in Denmark will generate $7.23 (USD) in revenue for Microsoft’s Danish partners over the next four years*.

Innovating for a sustainable future

With 100 percent renewable energy, the datacenter region will enable Danish customers to reduce their own carbon footprint associated with computing while accelerating digitization. According to The Footprint Firm**, the total emissions from on-premises servers in Denmark amount to an estimated 355,000 tons of CO2 per year. A report from WSP*** shows that Microsoft Cloud services can be up to 93 percent more energy efficient than traditional enterprise datacenters.

Microsoft is working with Energinet to explore future ways of tracking and matching renewable energy on an hourly basis. Building on Energinet’s pioneering work and open-source data approach with Azure, Microsoft intends to support the launch of a new renewable energy supply option, which provides customers more transparency about carbon mitigation from clean energy.

Digital upskilling for Denmark’s workforce

As part of the investment, Microsoft also pledges to bring digital upskilling to 200,000 Danes of all ages and skill levels, by 2024. It includes in-depth training programs and Azure certification for partners and customers, digital education opportunities for children and youth, and through LinkedIn Learning, free access to learning paths, job-seeking tools, and low-cost technical certifications for jobseekers and the unemployed.

“With this investment, we’re taking the next step in our longstanding commitment to provide Danish society and businesses with the digital tools, skills and infrastructure needed to drive sustainable growth, innovation, and job creation. We’re investing in Denmark’s digital leap into the future – all in a way that supports the country’s ambitious climate goals and economic recovery,” said Nana Bule, General Manager, Microsoft Denmark.

Speaking at today’s event, Jean-Philippe Courtois, Executive Vice President and President, Microsoft Global Sales, Marketing and Operations, said, “Today’s announcement is the next big step in our commitment to Denmark, which started over 30 years ago. The cloud plays a critical role, supported by passionate people, to help create a sustainable and inclusive economic recovery. As the world becomes more digital, it’s essential that citizens at all levels have the necessary skills to participate in the digital economy and society. This is why we’re committing to help upskill 200,000 Danes by 2024, contributing to the digital transformation of both public sector and industry in Denmark.”