According to the company, its revenue was $64.7 billion, an increase of 15% over the year-ago quarter. Net income came in at $22 billion, also an increase of 15% from the year-ago quarter. Earnings per share were $2.95, an increase of 10%.

“Our strong performance this fiscal year speaks both to our innovation and to the trust customers continue to place in Microsoft,” said Satya Nadella, chairman and chief executive officer of Microsoft. “As a platform company, we are focused on meeting the mission-critical needs of our customers across our at-scale platforms today, while also ensuring we lead the AI era.”

“We closed out our fiscal year with a solid quarter, highlighted by record bookings and Microsoft Cloud quarterly revenue of $36.8 billion, up 21% (up 22% in constant currency) year-over-year,” said Amy Hood, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Microsoft.

According to GeekWire, Microsoft told employees it plans to give a one-time cash award in addition to their annual bonus. The cash bonus is slated to be anywhere from 10% to 25% of their annual bonus.

“The senior leadership team and I want to recognize the tremendous work and impact of our people who delivered a terrific year of solid execution and world-class innovation,” wrote Chief People Officer Kathleen Hogan in a company memo.

“All Microsoft employees in levels 67 and below, including hourly and equivalents, who receive FY24 rewards will be eligible to receive a special one-time only cash award in addition to their annual rewards,” Hogan added. “This special one-time cash award will scale based on the employee’s FY24 impact.”

Hogan said the cash award is a reflection of the role employees have played in the company’s stellar quarter.

“We recognize our FY24 success is a direct result of the incredible focus, creativity, and collaboration of our people and our collective efforts as One Microsoft,” Hogan wrote. “We are grateful for your dedication to our mission so that together we can continue to empower everyone around the world.”

GeekWire says Microsoft has intentionally structured the award to give more to newer employees who have less seniority, as well as less stock options.

“For example, employees in higher levels such as 67 would receive a cash award equivalent to approximately 10% of their annual bonus, whereas employees level 61 and below would receive a cash award equivalent to approximately 25% of their annual bonus,” Hogan wrote. “As the SLT considered this award, our goal was to ensure that everyone eligible receives a meaningful amount at all levels, and thus the differences in percentage of bonus based on level.”

It’s good to see companies valuing the role employees play in their success, and Microsoft is to be commended for taking the step it has.

Microsoft acknowledged the issue early Tuesday morning in an X post:

Shortly after, Azure Support acknowledged that Azure Services is also experiencing issues:

Interestingly, Microsoft originally said more information could be found at status.cloud.microsoft before realizing the status page is also affected and unavailable.

Microsoft has had a rough couple of weeks, thanks to the CrowdStrike debacle. This latest outage is not likely to win the company any accolades.

In a significant technological crisis, a global Microsoft outage early Friday morning brought various sectors, including flights, banks, media outlets, and companies, to a standstill. The outage, linked to a faulty update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike, left travelers stranded at major airports like JFK and LaGuardia and disrupted operations worldwide.

It's confirmed !! Crowdstrike Issue Guys, they are working on it, in about maybe 45 mins things will be fix #csagent #crowdstrike #BSOD pic.twitter.com/0mkfRbUAF8

— Xaaavier_8613 (@Xaaavier_8613) July 19, 2024

Airports and Airlines Hit Hard

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) advised commuters in New York that customer information systems were temporarily offline due to the technical outage. However, train and bus services continued to run. The Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) service was unaffected, but arrival information, station announcements, and platform signs were taken offline.

LaGuardia Airport faced the brunt of the disruptions, canceling 30 flights and delaying 10 others. At JFK Airport, travelers endured lengthy delays as 16 flights were canceled. Smaller airlines such as Frontier Airlines, Allegiant, and SunCountry reported outages earlier, while major carriers like American, Delta, and United acknowledged a technology issue with a third-party vendor.

Frontier Airlines was among the first to explicitly link the disruptions to a “major Microsoft technical outage.” The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) confirmed that it was closely monitoring the situation, and several airlines requested assistance with ground stops.

Government and Industry Reactions

U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg stated that the department was monitoring Frontier’s flight cancellation and delay issues, emphasizing that the government would hold airlines accountable for meeting passenger needs. Meanwhile, CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz announced that the IT issue causing the global outage had been identified and a fix deployed. He clarified that the problem was not due to a security incident or cyberattack.

CrowdStrike’s update caused outages for millions of users of Microsoft Windows devices worldwide. The company said its engineers had undone the change but clients would need to use a workaround to download a fix to affected computers. “CrowdStrike is actively working with customers impacted by a defect found in a single content update for Windows hosts,” Kurtz posted on X.

Impact Across Various Sectors

The website DownDetector, which tracks user-reported internet outages, showed escalating disruptions in services at Visa, ADT security, Amazon, and various airlines, including American Airlines and Delta. The outage also affected news outlets, telecommunications providers, banks, and media broadcasters in Australia, the UK, Europe, and India.

In New Zealand, acting Prime Minister David Seymour stated that officials were moving quickly to understand the potential impacts of the global problem. He noted that there was no indication of malicious cyber activity. Israel’s Cyber Directorate reported that the outage affected the country’s post offices and hospitals, attributing the issue to a problem with CrowdStrike’s cybersecurity platform.

In the U.S., the FAA noted that airlines such as United, American, Delta, and Allegiant were all grounded. Travelers at Los Angeles International Airport were seen sleeping on jetway floors due to delays. In the UK, the budget airline Ryanair and train operators like TransPennine Express and Govia Thameslink Railway faced disruptions. At London’s Stansted Airport, some check-in services were completed manually, although flights continued to operate.

International Disruptions

Widespread problems were reported at Australian airports, where passengers experienced long queues due to disabled online check-in services and self-service booths. In India, thousands of passengers faced disruptions, with privately-owned IndiGo airlines announcing that the Microsoft outage impacted operations.

Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport reported a “major impact on flights,” particularly on one of the busiest days of the year for the airport. In Germany, Berlin Airport announced delays in check-in processes, suspending flights until 10 a.m. Zurich Airport in Switzerland also suspended landings but allowed flights already in the air to land. Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci airport reported delays for some U.S.-bound flights.

Microsoft’s Response

Microsoft stated that the outage began around 6 p.m. ET on Thursday and that the company was working on rerouting impacted traffic to alternate systems to alleviate the issue more expediently. The company observed a positive trend in service availability but did not provide further details on the cause of the outage.

Broader Implications and Continuing Impact

The global outage highlights the vulnerability of critical infrastructure to technical failures, even in the absence of malicious attacks. With major airlines, banks, media outlets, and other sectors heavily reliant on cloud services, such disruptions underscore the need for robust contingency planning.

In the U.S., many 911 and non-emergency call centers weren’t working properly, according to the Alaska State Troopers. Frontier Airlines had late Thursday blamed a Microsoft technical outage for forcing it to implement a ground stoppage, leading to flight delays and cancellations.

Amsterdam Schiphol Airport—one of the continent’s biggest connecting hubs—was shut to all arrivals due to the issues, according to Eurocontrol, Europe’s air-traffic-control agency. KLM Royal Dutch Airlines said it had suspended most of its operations. London Gatwick was also experiencing issues, a spokesperson said. “We are using our backup process, but some passengers may experience delays while checking in and passing through security.”

Brandenburg Airport in Berlin halted operations until 10 a.m. local time, a spokeswoman said, and a notice on the airport’s website said a technical issue delayed check-in for passengers. Flights into five airports in Spain—including Barcelona—and arrivals into Berlin have also been limited, according to Eurocontrol.

At Australia’s busiest airport in Sydney, airline operations and terminal services were affected Friday afternoon local time, an airport spokesperson said. Qantas, the country’s biggest airline, said it was experiencing “some impacts to systems due to a global software issue that is impacting a number of other businesses.” The airline said flights were operating with some delays. A spokesperson for rival Virgin Australia said some cancellations and delays were expected.

Similar travel disruptions were reported in Turkey, Hong Kong, and India, where budget carrier SpiceJet said it had reverted to manual check-in and boarding processes. The London Stock Exchange’s news service was down. Known as RNS, the service publishes market-moving company announcements such as earnings reports and executive changes. A banner on the stock exchange website blamed a “3rd party global technical issue” but said other services operated normally.

Hospitals and Emergency Services Affected

In Britain and Germany, hospitals reported problems. Several practices within the National Health Service in England reported that the outage had hit their clinical computer system, which contains medical records and is used for scheduling. “We have no access to patient clinical records so are unable to book appointments or provide information,” Church Lane Surgery in Brighouse in Northern England said on X. The NHS did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

In northern Germany, the Schleswig-Holstein University Hospital, which has branches in Kiel and Luebeck, said it had canceled all elective surgery scheduled for Friday, though patient and emergency care were unaffected.

Media Outlets and Financial Institutions Struggle

News outlets in Australia, including ABC and Sky News, were unable to broadcast on their TV and radio channels and reported sudden shutdowns of Windows-based computers. Some news anchors broadcast live online from dark offices in front of computers showing “blue screens of death.” In South Africa, at least one major bank experienced “nationwide service disruptions” as customers reported they were unable to make payments using their bank cards at grocery stores and gas stations. The New Zealand banks ASB and Kiwibank said their services were down.

An X user posted a screenshot of an alert from CrowdStrike stating that the company was aware of “reports of crashes on Windows hosts” related to its Falcon Sensor platform. The alert was posted on a password-protected CrowdStrike site and could not be verified. CrowdStrike did not respond to a request for comment.

Moving Forward

The global outage caused by CrowdStrike’s update has emphasized the need for robust contingency planning and a reevaluation of dependencies on single points of failure within critical infrastructure. While the immediate technical issue has been addressed, the broader implications for cybersecurity, operational resilience, and global coordination remain areas of significant concern for industries and governments worldwide.

The Graviton line of chips was a first for the industry, an Arm-based chip designed for cloud computing. As Amazon points out, Arm chips are some of the most widely used chips on the planet, powering the majority of smartphones and tablets. Despite the performance and power efficiency they offer, adapting them for the cloud computing industry was a more difficult task.

The first version of Graviton was developed by Annapurna Labs, which AWS acquired in 2015. The first generation of Graviton was first deployed by AWS in 2018, and the company has continued to improve it in the years since.

With the release of Graviton4, AWS says the new chips is four times fater than Graviton1 and uses 60% “less energy for the same performance as comparable Amazon EC2 instances.” Several AWS customers, including SAP, Epic Games, and SmugMug have already been benefiting from the new chips.

AWS has been driving the industry embrace of processors designed explicitly for cloud workloads, and has been at the forefront of enabling their broad use in cloud applications as well as working with partners to make them accessible to more and more customers. With Graviton, AWS was, and is, at the forefront of this custom chip evolution. But the revolution in custom silicon for the cloud doesn’t end there. With the latest generation of AWS chips engineered for AI, Trainium and Inferentia, AWS is extending the chip development environment—the combination of hardware and supporting software—and the success that began five years ago with Graviton.

Rifi’s platform, housed in the cloud, empowers data teams to stay ahead of the curve by offering unparalleled visibility into their operations. Sanjay highlights two key features that define Rifi’s offering. Firstly, the platform helps teams manage their budgets effectively, ensuring they don’t exceed allocations for cloud services like Snowflake or BigQuery. This proactive approach to cost management saves money and fosters trust within organizations, as data flows smoothly and reliably.

Secondly, Rifi prioritizes the time of data teams, recognizing that efficiency is crucial for building trust and making informed decisions. Sanjay notes that Rifi has enabled some customers to drastically reduce escalations from data teams to their businesses, a testament to the platform’s ability to streamline operations and increase productivity.

One of Rifi’s standout success stories involves a public company with a $10 billion market cap. Within just three weeks of implementing Rifi’s solution on BigQuery, the company noticed a significant increase in failed jobs, indicating issues with data accessibility. Instead of resorting to the traditional approach of requesting more resources, Rifi’s platform enabled the company to identify the root cause of the problem quickly: certain user and query patterns consuming excessive capacity. By addressing these issues promptly, the company was able to free up nearly a quarter-million dollars worth of capacity, demonstrating the tangible impact of Rifi’s technology on the bottom line.

When asked about Rifi’s approach to innovation, Sanjay emphasizes the company’s commitment to listening to its customers. With clients spanning various industries, including public, healthcare, finance, and startups, Rifi understands the diverse needs and challenges facing data teams today. By staying attuned to customer feedback and continuously iterating on its platform, Rifi ensures that it remains at the forefront of innovation, delivering solutions that meet the dynamic demands of the modern tech landscape.

In conclusion, Rifi’s groundbreaking approach to data observability and rapid issue detection is revolutionizing the way organizations harness and leverage their data. By combining cutting-edge technology with a customer-centric approach, Rifi empowers data teams to navigate the complexities of today’s digital world with confidence and agility.

Data sovereignty is an increasingly important element in cloud computing, as governments work to ensure data for their companies and citizens is processed in accordance with their laws, rather than the laws of other jurisdictions. The EU and the UK both have laws requiring cloud providers to guarantee data sovereignty.

According to Computer Weekly, Microsoft has admitted to the Scottish Police Authority (SPA) that it cannot guarantee that data collected in the UK will remain within the country, and that data is regularly transferred overseas for processing.

“They’ve confirmed for the first time that a guarantee of sovereignty for data at rest (which is what they give) does not extend to data being processed (which is what everyone chose to assume) and does not cover support (which everyone ignored),” said Owen Sayers, a security consultant who filed the freedom of information (FOI) request that resulted in the revelation.

“The sovereignty measures committed to by Microsoft do NOT extend to support of any services – this will always be likely to result in international transfers.”

The issue is made worse by the fact that the data in question is related to police operations, making it far more sensitive that data collected or processed on behalf of individual cloud users. With the FOI request, UK law enforcement can no longer claim ignorance regarding how Microsoft handles such data.

“A line has been drawn beneath the period of ‘we didn’t know’ and anyone using this technology now is knowingly breaching UK law,” he said.

In a statement to Computer Weekly, Microsoft said it previously worked with UK police forces on the issues.

“Microsoft has strong data protection and data residency commitments for Azure, which hosts Axon’s Digital Evidence Sharing Capability,” said a Microsoft spokesperson. “We have not made any contractual commitments that change how Azure services already run. We have worked with Police Scotland to clarify how Azure operates to help them determine that they can use DESC on Azure in compliance with the obligations for law enforcement set out under Part 3 of the Data Protection Act 2018.”

It remains to be seen if there will be additional fallout from the FOI revelation, or if other jurisdictions will follow up with their own investigations. Either way, the situation reveals the challenges that exist with cloud computing and maintain data sovereignty and data privacy.

OpenAI has a close working relationship with Microsoft, who is also its biggest investor. The company’s tech powers Microsoft Copilot and Bing’s AI search capabilities. OpenAI’s models also feature prominently in Microsoft’s Azure AI platform.

The choice to tap Oracle for additional capacity is an interesting one, and a testament to the performance and power of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI).

OCI’s leading AI infrastructure is advancing AI innovation. OpenAI will join thousands of AI innovators across industries worldwide that run their AI workloads on OCI AI infrastructure. Adept, Modal, MosaicML, NVIDIA, Reka, Suno, Together AI, Twelve Labs, xAI, and others use OCI Supercluster to train and inference next-generation AI models.

“We are delighted to be working with Microsoft and Oracle. OCI will extend Azure’s platform and enable OpenAI to continue to scale,” said Sam Altman, Chief Executive Officer, OpenAI.

“The race to build the world’s greatest large language model is on, and it is fueling unlimited demand for Oracle’s Gen2 AI infrastructure,” said Larry Ellison, Oracle Chairman and CTO. “Leaders like OpenAI are choosing OCI because it is the world’s fastest and most cost-effective AI infrastructure.”

Oracle has become an increasingly important cloud infrastructure provider. In fact, at a recent quarterly earnings report, executives said the company was struggling to keep up with the demand.

“Large new cloud infrastructure contracts signed in Q3 drove Oracle’s total Remaining Performance Obligations up 29% to over $80 billion—an all-time record,“ Oracle CEO Safra Catz said at the time. “We expect to continue receiving large contracts reserving cloud infrastructure capacity because the demand for our Gen2 AI infrastructure substantially exceeds supply—despite the fact we are opening new and expanding existing cloud datacenters very, very rapidly.

Larry Ellison has long touted Oracle Cloud’s reliability, saying it represents a major advantage over its larger rivals.

“Let me close with a note that I’m going to paraphrase from a very large telecommunications company who uses our cloud and all the other three North American clouds — Google, Amazon and Microsoft,” Ellison once said. “And the note basically said the one thing we’ve noticed about Oracle, Oracle’s cloud, is that it never ever goes down. We can’t say that about any of the other clouds. We think this is a critical differentiator.”

SysOps engineer Robin Dev took to Substack to detail the issues his company experienced when Cloudflare reached out to try to migrate the account to its Enterprise plan:

TL;DR:

We’ve been on the Cloudflare Business plan ($250/month) for years. They suddenly contacted us and asked us to either pay them $120k up front for one year of Enterprise within 24 hours or they would take down all of our domains. While this escalated up our business we had 3 sales calls with them, trying to figure out what was happening and how to reach a reasonable contract in a week. When we told them we were also in talks with Fastly, they suddenly “purged” all our domains, causing huge downtime in our core business, sleepless nights migrating away from CF, irreparable loss in customer trust and weeks of ongoing downtime in our internal systems.

Throughout the process, Cloudflare sent emails to Dev’s company that conflicted with the action Cloudflare was taking. For example, some emails seemed to indicate a monthly plan was possible, even though Cloudflare was demanding an entire year’s payment upfront. Similarly, Cloudflare sent an email when it suspended the company’s account saying “this account suspension does not impact, disable, or remove your current services.” In reality, nothing could be further from the truth.

Cloudflare had suddenly deleted all of our domains. All of our DNS records, caching setup, rate limits, whitelists, gone. Our public website, our incoming emails (including support emails from our customers) and our internal infrastructure, our authentication configuration on Cloudflare Access, down.

The email says “this […] does not impact current services”, so we frantically wrote them a support ticket but got no response. So we called in our SysOps team and started migrating our main site to Fastly. We had the basics after a few hours, but even then, a “NS” DNS entry change apparently takes a pretty arbitrary time to propagate everywhere, from 1h to 48 hours. We’re still recovering from the aftermath.

As Dev points out, much of the issue comes from Cloudflare’s opaque terms, making it almost impossible to predict if or when Cloudflare will take such action.

Cloudflare has absolutely no information on when they will force you into custom billing, but when they start “urgently” needing to talk to you you’re probably not going to get out until you have a juicy custom contract with them. There’s a reason why they have no public information anywhere on traffic limits or Enterprise pricing. Their Sales team will use anything (like having multiple domains) as fuel to force your whole account to Enterprise , no matter if it is fixable in a simple way.

Popular YouTube and developer ThePrimeagen theorizes that Cloudflare’s sales team is engaging in this behavior in part because the company’s CEO called out the sales team for under-performing.

Although we’ve won a third of the Fortune 500 customers, if we’re honest with ourselves, we saw a lot of our success with our enterprise customers because our products were so good and solved real problems that every big company faces. That allowed many on our sales team to succeed largely by just taking orders. When the fish are jumping right in the boat, you don’t need to be a very good fisherman. But at the risk of mixing watering metaphors, as the tide goes out, you get a clear view who’s not wearing shorts.

The macroeconomic environment has gotten harder, and we’re seeing that some on our team aren’t dressed for work. Digging in with Marc, we’ve identified more than 100 people on our sales team who have consistently missed expectations. Simply put, a significant percentage of our sales force has been repeatedly underperforming based on measurable performance targets and critical KPIs. That’s obviously a problem.

As a result, the sales team may be engaging in actions that can only be described as shakedowns in an effort to save their jobs.

According to Reuters, AWS is looking to either expand its existing facilities in Milan or build on a new site. The investment will help support the company’s cloud presence in Europe.

Much of AWS’ increased investments in Europe are being driven by the company’s commitment to data sovereignty, promising to store data for EU organizations and companies within the bloc. The issue has been a growing source of concern in recent years, as EU lawmakers have grown wary of data being sent to the US where it could be vulnerable to US intelligence agencies.

The company recently announced a major expansion in Spain as well, although Reuters reports that an expansion in Italy may not be as large as that 15.7 euros deal.

The EU’s strict privacy laws set limits on how and when companies can transfer data to the US. As a result, US-based cloud companies must provide a way to handle EU customer data within the bloc. AWS has made clear its long-term commitment to its AWS European Sovereign Cloud.

From day one, AWS has believed it is essential that our customers have control over their data, and choices for how they secure and manage that data in the cloud. AWS gives customers the flexibility to choose how and where they want to run their workloads, including a proven track record of innovation to support specialised workloads around the world. We help customers meet stringent security, sovereignty, and privacy requirements in our existing sovereign-by-design AWS Regions.

The company says its investment will also help launch its first AWS Region in Brandenburg, Germany by the end of 2025. The investment is expected to contribute €17.2 billion to Germany’s economy through 2040, and support roughly 2,800 jobs in German businesses per year.

“This investment reinforces our commitment to offer customers the most advanced set of sovereignty controls, privacy safeguards, and security features available in the cloud. We’re investing heavily in new local talent and infrastructure, which will help provide the operational sovereignty our customers require,” said Max Peterson, Vice President of Sovereign Cloud at AWS. “This is an exciting milestone, and we’re looking forward to the ways that our customers and partners across Europe will drive further innovation with the AWS European Sovereign Cloud.”

“High performing, reliable, and secure infrastructure is the most important prerequisite for an increasingly digitalised economy and society. Brandenburg is making progress here. In recent years, we have set on a course to invest in modern and sustainable data centre infrastructure in our state, strengthening Brandenburg as a business location,” said Prof. Dr. Jörg Steinbach, Brandenburg’s Minister of Economic Affairs, Labour and Energy. “State-of-the-art data centres for secure cloud computing are the basis for a strong digital economy. I am pleased Amazon Web Services (AWS) has chosen Brandenburg for a long-term investment in its cloud computing infrastructure for the AWS European Sovereign Cloud.”

After almost 15 combined years at AWS, I am going to be moving on. It has been a true privilege to help lead this business from pre-revenue to $100B annualized revenue. I’m humbled by the many customers who have said they wouldn’t be what they are without AWS, thankful to our…

— Adam Selipsky (@aselipsky) May 14, 2024

A Legacy of Leadership and Innovation

Adam Selipsky, who rejoined AWS as CEO after a successful stint at Tableau, has been instrumental in driving the growth and innovation of the cloud unit. Under his leadership, AWS achieved a remarkable $100 billion revenue run rate, solidifying its position as the mainstay of Amazon’s cash flow. In a heartfelt letter to staff and shareholders, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy praised Selipsky’s contributions. “Adam leaves AWS in a strong position, having reached a $100 billion annual revenue run rate this past quarter, with YoY revenue accelerating again,” Jassy wrote. “I’m deeply appreciative of Adam’s leadership during this time, and for the entire team’s dedication to deliver for customers and the business.”

Selipsky’s departure follows a dynamic three-year tenure during which AWS navigated the complexities of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the challenges, the division thrived, making strategic decisions to help customers optimize their spending and launching several impactful generative AI services, such as Amazon Bedrock and Amazon Q. “Leading this amazing team and the AWS business has been a privilege,” Selipsky noted in his farewell message. “I am proud of all we’ve accomplished, going from a start-up to where we are today.”

The Rise of Matt Garman

Matt Garman, who will succeed Selipsky, brings a wealth of experience and a deep understanding of AWS’s operations. Having joined Amazon as an MBA intern in 2005, Garman has held numerous positions across the company, from product management to leading worldwide sales, marketing, support, and professional services for AWS. His journey within Amazon is a testament to his adaptability and leadership skills.

“Matt has an unusually strong set of skills and experiences for his new role,” Jassy wrote. “He’s very customer-focused, a terrific product leader, inventive, a clever problem-solver, and has high standards and a meaningful bias for action.” Garman’s ascent to CEO reflects Amazon’s commitment to internal development and continuity. His appointment ensures that the cloud unit remains at the forefront of innovation and customer service.

Strategic Vision and Future Prospects

Garman’s appointment comes at a critical juncture for AWS. The cloud unit not only supports Amazon’s other ventures in e-commerce, healthcare, and logistics but also serves as a leader in providing infrastructure for large language models and AI. As Amazon continues to expand its footprint in the generative AI market, Garman’s experience in both product development and sales will be invaluable.

In his message to the AWS team, Garman expressed optimism about the future. “I am more optimistic than I have ever been for the potential for innovation and growth ahead of us, and I look forward to helping us move faster, invent more, and operate as one team to help our customers,” he said. “For me, AWS is much more than just a business. We are a team of missionaries working passionately to help make our customers’ lives and businesses better every day.”

Navigating the Pandemic and Beyond

Selipsky took over AWS in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, a period marked by unprecedented challenges and rapid changes. Under his direction, AWS made strategic long-term decisions to help customers become more efficient in their spend, even if it meant less short-term revenue for AWS. This customer-centric approach has been a hallmark of AWS’s strategy, reinforcing its reputation as a reliable partner for businesses navigating digital transformation.

“Adam took over at a time of great uncertainty,” noted Jassy. “Under his leadership, the team made the right long-term decisions to help customers become more efficient in their spend, even if it meant less short-term revenue for AWS. Throughout, the team continued to invent and release new services at a rapid clip.”

Innovation at the Core

During Selipsky’s tenure, AWS continued to innovate at a breakneck pace, introducing several impactful services that have set new standards in the industry. One of the notable achievements was the launch of Amazon Bedrock, a platform designed to help businesses build and deploy AI models efficiently. Another significant introduction was Amazon Q, a service aimed at simplifying the integration of AI into everyday business operations.

“We’ve always focused on helping our customers be more successful,” Selipsky remarked in an internal memo. “By continually innovating and launching new services, we’ve enabled businesses of all sizes to leverage the power of the cloud and AI to drive their own success.”

Preparing for the Future

As AWS looks to the future, Garman’s leadership is expected to bring a renewed focus on customer experience and product innovation. His extensive background in product management and his recent experience leading global sales and marketing efforts position him uniquely to drive AWS forward.

“Matt knows our customers and business as well as anybody in the world,” Jassy emphasized. “His senior leadership experience on both the product and demand generation sides will be invaluable as we continue to invent our future.”

Garman, in his message to the team, highlighted his commitment to maintaining AWS’s trajectory of growth and innovation. “Over the last 18 years, I have been fortunate enough to get to work on many different aspects of the AWS business,” Garman stated. “But one constant has been the world-class talent and the unwavering customer obsession of the people I have gotten to work with. I’m excited to get started and help us move faster, invent more, and operate as one team to help our customers.”

Wow! Quite the change coming for @awscloud. I thought @aselipsky brought what AWS needed for the next phase. Matt Garman will bring a different vibe more toward @ajassy's style.

Amazon Web Services CEO Adam Selipsky to step down https://t.co/3zBA5nhJXX#CIO #cloud $AMZN

— Tim Crawford (@tcrawford) May 14, 2024

Broader Implications for Amazon

The leadership transition at AWS is not just a significant event for the cloud unit; it has broader implications for Amazon as a whole. AWS is a crucial component of Amazon’s overall strategy, contributing significantly to the company’s revenue and profitability. As the primary driver of Amazon’s cash flow, the continued success of AWS is vital to funding Amazon’s diverse ventures and innovations across various sectors.

Amazon’s investment in cloud technology has positioned it as a leader in the industry, with AWS providing the backbone for many of the world’s most prominent digital services. The division’s continued growth and innovation under Garman will be closely watched by competitors and customers alike. As AWS continues to push the boundaries of what cloud technology can achieve, it will play a critical role in shaping the future of digital infrastructure and AI development.

The Future of Cloud Computing

The future of AWS, under Garman’s leadership, promises to be exciting. With a strong foundation built by Selipsky and a visionary leader in Garman, AWS is well-positioned to continue leading the cloud computing market. The division is expected to further its advancements in AI, machine learning, and other cutting-edge technologies.

“AWS has always been about pushing the envelope,” Garman said. “From our early days as a start-up to becoming a key player in the tech industry, we’ve always strived to be at the forefront of innovation. I look forward to continuing this tradition and helping our customers achieve their goals.”

As AWS continues to evolve, its impact on the tech industry and the broader economy will be profound. The division’s strategic investments, such as the recent $11 billion commitment in Indiana, underscore its long-term vision and commitment to growth. These investments are expected to create at least 1,000 jobs and support new workforce development training programs, highlighting AWS’s role in driving economic development alongside technological innovation.

Conclusion

As Adam Selipsky steps down and Matt Garman steps up, AWS is poised for a new chapter of growth and innovation. With a strong foundation built by Selipsky and a visionary leader in Garman, AWS is well-positioned to continue leading the cloud computing market and driving forward the next wave of technological advancements. The seamless transition in leadership ensures that AWS will maintain its momentum and continue to deliver exceptional value to its customers and stakeholders.

The cloud computing giant’s next steps will be closely watched, as Garman takes the helm with a blend of deep institutional knowledge and a forward-thinking vision. The world will be eager to see how AWS continues to shape the future of technology and what new heights it can achieve under its new leadership.

UniSuper began experiencing issues on Thursday, May 2, with members unable to access many of the company’s services. The outage continued for several days, and is still causing problems as of the time of writing. The cause of the outage is the most interesting fact, however, with Google Cloud admitting that “an isolated, one-of-a-kind occurrence’ caused UniSuper’s entire private cloud subscription to be canceled.

“This is an isolated, ‘one-of-a-kind occurrence’ that has never before occurred with any of Google Cloud’s clients globally,” said a joint statement from UniSuper CEO Peter Chun and Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian. “This should not have happened. Google Cloud has identified the events that led to this disruption and taken measures to ensure this does not happen again.”

UniSuper maintained its data in two geographies, specifically to protect against outages. Unfortunately, when Google Cloud canceled the company’s subscription, it deleted UniSuper’s data in both locations.

Restoring UniSuper’s Private Cloud instance has called for an incredible amount of focus, effort, and partnership between our teams to enable an extensive recovery of all the core systems. The dedication and collaboration between UniSuper and Google Cloud has led to an extensive recovery of our Private Cloud which includes hundreds of virtual machines, databases and applications.

The incident is not a good look for Google Cloud and raises serious questions about how the issue was able to happen in the first place. Kurian’s response that it was a “one-of-a-kind occurrence” is not reassuring, since this scenario happening even once is one too many times.

While UniSuper has assured its members that their accounts and funds are safe, not being able to access those accounts for the better part of a week is a worst-case scenario for the superannuation fund, a scenario of Google’s creation.

Interestingly, and not unexpectedly, UniSuper has not committed to remaining with Google Cloud following this episode. In response to a FAQ on its site about whether it would continue using Google after the incident, UniSuper had this to say:

UniSuper takes our responsibility to provide reliable services to our members extremely seriously. Our focus is on getting systems back online swiftly, safely and securely.

We are concurrently working closely with Google Cloud on finalising a full root cause analysis. Google Cloud has confirmed that this was an unprecedented, isolated occurrence, and that measures have been taken to ensure this issue does not happen again. We will assess this incident and ensure we are best positioned to deliver services for our members.

Understanding AWS’s Market Position

AWS commands a significant portion of the cloud market, with a sustained market share of over 40%. According to Bloomberg Intelligence Technology Analyst Anurag Rana, this dominance is attributable to the breadth of AWS’s services and its deep investment in AI technologies that reshape how companies operate.

“Amazon’s infrastructure layer offers the raw materials for businesses to build sophisticated AI applications, from data storage and compute power to advanced machine learning and analytics tools,” Rana explained during a discussion on Bloomberg. This robust foundation allows AWS to cater to various business needs, from startups to global enterprises.

Capitalizing on AI Demand

The demand for AI is not just about automating routine tasks but also about leveraging complex AI algorithms to gain insights from data, enhance decision-making, and create new customer experiences. AWS has been at the forefront of offering these capabilities, making it an attractive platform for companies looking to integrate AI into their operations.

“AWS is not merely a service provider; it’s an innovation enabler. Its comprehensive AI and machine learning services allow companies to deploy sophisticated AI applications quickly and at scale,” Rana noted.

Strategic Investments and Financial Insights

Amazon has committed substantial financial resources to expand its AI capabilities to support this growing demand. This includes investments in data centers, computing hardware, and specialized AI research and development. Rana highlighted the substantial capital expenditures AWS is planning, which are expected to exceed $65 billion, underscoring the scale of Amazon’s commitment to maintaining and expanding its infrastructure.

While these investments imply lower margins in the short term, they are critical for sustaining long-term growth and staying ahead of competitors like Microsoft and Google, who are also aggressively expanding their AI offerings.

The Challenge of Maintaining Margins

One of the significant challenges facing AWS is the pressure on profit margins. High initial investments in AI technologies and infrastructure expansion are costly, and as Rana points out, maintaining the historically high margins AWS has enjoyed may not be feasible as expenses rise.

“While AWS has enjoyed high-profit margins historically, the increasing need to invest in expanding and updating their AI and cloud infrastructure will likely compress margins,” Rana stated. However, these investments are necessary to meet the rapidly growing demand for AI-driven solutions and to ensure AWS’s continued leadership in the market.

Future Outlook

AWS’s strategy appears to be firmly centered on leveraging AI to drive growth. This involves enhancing existing cloud services and developing new AI-driven products and services that can open up additional revenue streams.

As AI continues to evolve, AWS’s ability to integrate these advancements into its offerings will be crucial for attracting new customers and retaining existing ones. Moreover, AWS’s broad portfolio and deep pockets allow it to experiment with innovative AI applications, potentially leading to groundbreaking new services that could redefine the technology landscape.

AWS’s AI-driven growth strategy is a calculated response to the evolving demands of the modern digital economy. By continuing to invest heavily in AI and cloud infrastructure, Amazon reinforces its market leadership and sets the stage for the next generation of technological innovations that could transform entire industries.

Microsoft announced the the change in a blog post. The company says offline mode brings benefits even when connected.

Offline mode uses your device’s local storage to store certain file information such as file name, size, author, last date accessed, etc. This is made possible through the OneDrive Sync app, which intelligently stores a cache of your files’ metadata locally.

One of the primary benefits of this local cache is that it significantly improves load-times for OneDrive in your browser and speeds up viewing and interacting with your OneDrive files in your browser or OneDrive app in Microsoft Teams and Outlook. By accessing your content from your local cache instead of fetching it from a cloud server, data retrieval speeds are significantly improved. The result? A smooth OneDrive experience that’s insulated against slow or intermittent connections.

Furthermore, this enhancement has the added advantage of bypassing cloud service-related throttling issues. This is particularly beneficial when working with extremely large collections of files, numbering in the hundreds of thousands. You get smoother and faster access to large volumes of files without any hindrance.

The new feature is a welcome improvement for OneDrive users.

AWS has a long history of investing in Indiana, with the company investing some $21.5 billion in the state since 2010. The company’s latest round of investment of $11 billion is the largest yet, and will help create at least 1,000 new jobs. The company will also contribute up to $7 million to support local and state road infrastructure improvements.

“AWS’s unwavering commitment to supporting our customers and helping drive digital transformation has been evident through our infrastructure investments across the United States,” said Roger Wehner, AWS director of economic development. “Building upon this, we are thrilled to be expanding our operations in Indiana through this planned $11 billion investment, which will create numerous well-paying job opportunities and tap into the state’s burgeoning tech sector, while contributing significantly to the state’s growing economy. This investment will include our continuing commitment to fostering workforce development and educational initiatives in areas where we operate, and we look forward to helping nurture the next generation of talent in the Hoosier State. We are excited to partner with Governor Holcomb, IEDC, and other state and local leaders to forge a path toward a brighter future for Indiana’s tech landscape.”

AWS is also launching the AWS InCommunities St. Joseph County Community Fund grant fund. The fund will support initiatives in “science, technology, engineering, arts, and math (STEAM) education; sustainability and environment; economic development; future workforce development; inclusion, diversity, and equity; and homelessness, hunger, health, and well-being.”

The company says it is committing $100,000 to the fund, which will be managed by ChangeX. Applicants aligned with one of the above themes can apply for grants of up to $10,000 to use on such a project.

Indiana officials welcomes the company’s investment.

“Indiana’s long-term economic strategy is paying dividends for Hoosiers as we cultivate the growth of critical sectors like technology infrastructure,” said Governor Holcomb. “Amazon has long been an important economic partner in Indiana, and we are excited to welcome AWS. This significant investment solidifies Indiana’s leadership position in the economy of the future, and will undoubtedly have a positive ripple effect on the town of New Carlisle, the north central region and the state of Indiana for years to come.”

“The AWS announcement today will be a generational boost to our local and regional economy, and we are excited for the opportunity to welcome the AWS team and workforce into our community,” said Carl Baxmeyer, president, St. Joseph County Board of Commissioners. “This new data center campus to be built in the Indiana Enterprise Center (IEC) over the next decade will be a major employment center for all of northern Indiana. This project announcement also shows our alignment with the state’s goal to create next level jobs that benefit all Hoosiers.”

The issue appeared to begin late Friday evening or early Saturday morning. Users reported being logged out of their iCloud/Apple accounts, including any devices that were checking iCloud email with app-specific passwords.

In the case, I can attest to the widespread nature of the issue. Although I don’t use Apple devices, I do have an old iCloud account that I still use for email. Both of my personal computers, and my phone, started throwing authentication errors early Saturday morning.

A trip to https://appleid.apple.com/ revealed that my account was locked, requiring me to go through the steps to unlock it, choose an entirely new password, and set up app-specific passwords so the email clients on my devices could once again access my email account.

There has been no word from Apple regarding what happened, why the reset was forced on so many users, or if this is going to be a common occurrence.

Google Cloud has unveiled its latest innovations, aimed at helping companies unify database, analytics and AI.

Google Cloud is the third leading cloud provider, behind AWS and Microsoft Azure. The company is particularly viewed as a good option for machine learning development, and has strong support for open source software.

The company’s latest tools will go a long way toward improving its stand even further, with Dataplex, Datastream and Analytics Hub.

Dataplex is designed to “centrally manage, monitor and govern your data across data lakes, data warehouses and data marts, and make this data securely accessible to a variety of analytics and data science tools.”

Datastream, currently available in preview, helps “move and synchronize data between heterogeneous databases, storage and applications reliably to support real-time analytics, database replication and event-driven architectures with Datastream, our serverless change data capture (CDC) and replication service.”

Analytics Hub is designed to make it easy to “access and share valuable datasets and analytics assets (think BigQuery ML models, Looker Blocks, data quality recipes, etc.) across any organizational boundary.” Those interested will need to sign up for preview access.

The company’s latest tools should go a long way toward helping its customers make the most of their data, as well as AI applications.

As one of the most popular cloud storage features, security and encryption are paramount concerns. While Dropbox has always offered good security, the company has not always provided true E2EE, a noticeable disadvantage when compared with some rivals.

Encryption

According to founder and CEO Drew Houston, the company’s latest update brings seamless E2EE.

So today, we’re adding even more advanced data protection features, designed to be easy to use for all business teams. In addition to existing layers of security for all Dropbox accounts, business teams will now have access to:

• Seamless end-to-end encryption: Safeguards data so only the sender and recipient can access content, which means no one—not even Dropbox—can get into those files. Seamless end-to-end encryption is now natively integrated into team folders and eliminates the need for additional software subscriptions.
• Advanced key management: Add an extra layer of security by setting up a unique encryption key managed by FIPS 140-2 Level 3 key management services, providing more protection and easier management of all team Dropbox files.

In addition to E2EE, Dropbox is adding improved admin tools that also improve security.

We’re also introducing new tools to make it easier for admins to get vital information and visibility into team activity in one place:

• Improved Admin Experience: Manage team membership and invites from a central dashboard. Stay up-to-date on pending invites and license usage.
• Updated Trust Center: Simplify risk assessments of Dropbox products. Get self-serve, anytime access to information about security, reliability, privacy, and compliance, and complete internal reviews, audits, and risk assessments faster than ever.

DocSend Advanced Data Rooms

On the security front, Dropbox is adding an interesting new feature called DocSend Advanced Data Rooms. The feature is designed to be a one-stop virtual place where an entire deal can be conducted, “from initial pitch to final signature.”

With features like advanced permissioning and built-in NDAs, you have precise control over your most sensitive information. You can grant viewing, downloading, or uploading privileges to visitors and groups, or set granular permissions down to the file level.

Microsoft Integration

The update also brings improved integration with Microsoft teams, as well as real-time co-authoring for Microsoft 365, although this feature is still in beta.

Real-Time Co-Authoring (beta): One of Dropbox’s most-requested features ever, Co-Authoring allows multiple team members to collaboratively edit Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files from desktop, web, and mobile, natively within Dropbox. You can also see who’s in the document and where they’re editing in real-time, so everyone is working off the latest version. Now teams can finally put an end to conflicting copies.

The update also adds OneDrive support for Dropbox Replay.

Additional Features

In addition to the above headlining features, the update includes a slew of features designed to improve the web experience and give users faster access to their files. Users can now preview files as they navigate folders, pin favorite files for quick access, and use suggested quick actions that are based on a user’s workflow.

Paid users will also be able to use dynamic filters to access content faster, and search for files using smart suggestions.

Dropbox Replay has received a number of improvements, including rich media support, Avid Pro Tools integration, dynamic watermarking, and custom branding.

Drobpox Dash, AI-powered universal search also sees improvements with one-click access, a redesigned start page, and new connectors that support integration with 20 tools and apps.

Overall, this update is a massive one for Dropbox users, bringing important security enhancements and quality-of-life improvements for all.

According to Microsoft Coca-Cola has committed $1.1 billion to Microsoft Cloud and its generative AI platform. Coca-Cola is looking to adopt leading-edge technology and tap into the power of AI to help transform its business. The deal will see Microsoft Cloud become the beverage company’s preferred cloud platform.

“Through our long-term partnership, we have made significant progress to accelerate system-wide AI Transformation across The Coca-Cola Company and its network of independent bottlers worldwide,” said Judson Althoff, executive vice president and chief commercial officer at Microsoft. “We are proud to support Coca-Cola as it continues to embrace the era of AI and looks to solutions like Azure OpenAI Service and Copilot for Microsoft 365 to drive innovation across every area of its business.”

Microsoft says Coca-Cola has already migrated all of its application to Azure, along with many of the brand’s bottling partners. Coca-Cola has already been using the Azure OpenAI Service and wants to expand its AI deployment.

“This new agreement builds on the success of Coca-Cola’s partnership strategy with Microsoft, showing our commitment to ongoing digital transformation,” said John Murphy, president and chief financial officer of The Coca-Cola Company. “Our partnership with Microsoft has grown exponentially, from the $250 million agreement we initially announced in 2020 to $1.1 billion today.”

“Our expanded partnership with Microsoft is an important next chapter in Coca-Cola’s journey toward a digital-first enterprise powered by emerging technologies,” said Neeraj Tolmare, senior vice president and global chief information officer for The Coca-Cola Company. “Microsoft’s capabilities help accelerate our adoption of AI to create incremental enterprise value.”

The deal is a major win for the number two cloud provider, and an important vote of confidence at a time when Microsoft is facing increased scrutiny for its cloud security practices.

The WSJ reported that Salesforce was looking to acquire Informatica and that the two companies were in talks. Informatica’s says its “policy is not to comment on market rumors or media speculation,” but the company was impelled to make an exception in this case.

On April 12, 2024, The Wall Street Journal published a story that the Company was in advanced talks to be acquired, according to sources familiar with the matter. Although Informatica’s policy is not to comment on market rumors or media speculation, the Company announced that it is not currently engaged in any discussions to be acquired.

The company took the opportunity to update its outlook for the first quarter, saying its results will be within the upper half of the guidance ranges it had previously provided.

“Our business fundamentals continue to be very strong and we look forward to discussing our first quarter financial results and outlook on May 1,” said Amit Walia, CEO of Informatica.