Copilot for everything everywhere, all the time...
The Microsoft Ignite Event 2023 Keynote was extensive, covering various topics and announcements.
Generative AI and Microsoft Copilot: The keynote highlighted the impact of generative AI across various industries and functions, with over 700 use cases. Microsoft Copilot was emphasized as a tool that enhances productivity and creativity by assisting in multiple tasks and workflows.
Azure Infrastructure: Significant updates to Azure’s infrastructure were announced. This includes enhancements in power sourcing (particularly renewable energy), advanced network technology using hollow core fiber for increased speed, and the introduction of Azure Boost for improved server virtualization.
Server and CPU Innovations: Developments in server technology and CPUs were discussed. This includes partnerships with AMD and Intel to optimize server performance and the introduction of Azure Cobalt, a custom in-house CPU series explicitly designed for the Microsoft cloud.
AI Accelerators and Partnerships: Microsoft announced new AI accelerators and expanded partnerships, particularly with NVIDIA, to enhance AI training and inference capabilities in Azure. This includes the addition of NVIDIA’s latest GPU AI accelerator, H200, and the Azure Confidential GPU VMs for secure AI model processing.
Azure Maia – AI Accelerator: A new, fully custom in-house AI accelerator named Azure Maia was introduced. This accelerator is designed for large-scale AI workloads and features advanced cooling and power management technologies.
Foundation Models and Azure AI: Microsoft highlighted its partnership with OpenAI and its commitment to delivering the latest innovations as part of Azure AI. This includes bringing GPT-4 Turbo and GPT-4 Turbo with Vision to the Azure OpenAI Service.
Open Source AI Models and Azure AI Studio: Microsoft is expanding its support for open source AI models with a new “models as a service” offering in Azure. This allows developers to access large open-source models as hosted APIs. Azure AI Studio was also discussed as a comprehensive toolchain for building, customizing, and deploying AI models.
Microsoft Fabric: The general availability of Microsoft Fabric was announced. This platform unifies data and analytic workloads, integrating various data sources and offering AI-powered features to enhance productivity.
Integration and Applications: The keynote also covered the integration of AI across Microsoft’s data stack and the development of applications using AI models, highlighting how these technologies are transforming industries and workflows.
Partnership with NVIDIA: The partnership with NVIDIA was emphasized, focusing on how it has enabled the development of AI supercomputers and the integration of NVIDIA’s software stacks in Azure.