Predicting and detecting failures: How Azure strengthens reliability for mission-critical workloads

By Dustin Ward

Takeaway: Azure Failure Prediction and Detection (AFPD) is Microsoft Azure’s end-to-end system aiming to catch hardware failures before they interrupt a workload, not after. Across the Azure fleet, AFPD has improved the prevention of hardware-related VM interruptions by 36%. SAP workloads offer a compelling example of AFPD’s value, illustrating why preventing interruptions matters for mission-critical…

The Platform Behind the Next AI Breakthrough

By Dustin Ward

This article has been written and paid for by Microsoft. The content is not WIRED editorial content. The content does not necessarily reflect the views of WIRED, its affiliates, or owner, and does not reflect any endorsement direct or indirect of Microsoft, its affiliates, or other clients. The next frontier of AI is coming into…

Azure Cloud HSM Hardware Audit Logging: Verifiable audit trails for security and compliance

By Dustin Ward

Organizations running regulated and security-sensitive workloads need trusted evidence of which authenticated users performed management operations on their hardware security modules (HSMs), what actions they took, and when. Today, we are announcing Hardware Audit Logging for Azure Cloud HSM, which collects audit records generated by the HSM itself for supported management operations. Security, compliance, and…

Introducing the Microsoft Copilot harness in Foundry Agent Service

By Dustin Ward

A model can reason about a task. Completing that task takes more: the right context, tools, execution environment, and controls, and an agent loop that brings them together. Microsoft’s unified harness strategy brings a shared execution foundation across our agent experiences while preserving customer choice. In Microsoft Foundry, that means you can choose a supported…

Scale reservoir uncertainty analysis with agile reservoir modeling

By Dustin Ward

Turn subsurface uncertainty into decision-ready insight Drilling campaigns are among the most expensive and operationally complex activities in the energy industry. Rigs, crews, equipment, and logistics are scheduled months in advance, leaving little room for delay. Every hour of downtime can carry significant costs. Geoscientists and engineers rely on reservoir models to understand the subsurface…