Microsoft has unveiled new strategy for cloud computing with several important technology and partnership updates to Microsoft Azure.
Microsoft launched a new series of Virtual Machine sizes, called the G-series, offering more memory and more local Solid State Drive (SSD) storage than any current VM size in the public cloud. G-series will generally be available later this year.
The largest G-series will offer 448 GB RAM and 6.5 TB of local SSD storage. Powered by the latest Intel Xeon processor E5 v3 family, the virtual machine will deliver unparalleled computational performance, the company claims.
Microsoft also announced Azure Premium Storage, a new type of SSD-based storage, designed to support I/O intensive workloads. With Azure Premium Storage, users can provision a persistent disk and configure the size and performance characteristics that will meet your requirements.
Azure Marketplace, another innovation from Microsoft, is designed to connect startups and partners with enterprise customers. Users can quickly discover, purchase, and deploy the solution you want directly into Azure.
Microsoft also announced the addition of CoreOS and Cloudera as partners to the Marketplace. The company also announced a significant advancement in hybrid technology called the Cloud Platform System (CPS).
CPS is an Azure-consistent “cloud-in-a-box” that takes our learning from running Azure in the public cloud and builds that into a pre-integrated solution with hardware from Dell and software from Microsoft so that you and your partners can get many of Azure benefits in your datacenter, on your terms.
The announcement comes on the heels of Microsoft’s partnership with Docker to bring Docker to Windows Server and Azure.
Developers and organizations who want to create distributed, multi-container applications using Docker will be able to use Linux or Windows Server allowing developers to connect with the growing Docker ecosystem of users and tools.
Back in June, at DockerCon, Microsoft Open Technologies (MS Open Tech) announced simplified setup and deployment of the Docker Engine on Linux VMs using the Azure extension model.
Microsoft is expanding this extension support for the Docker Engine with direct integration into the Azure management portal, offering a first-class experience to deploy Docker on to Linux VMs in Azure.
Microsoft expects to release this integration later this month.
In another major development, MS Open Tech made a recent contribution delivering Azure support into the new Docker hosts functionality, available as part of the next version of Docker.
Microsoft Azure has made big strides across all industry verticals, helping customers drive their business forward. Some of these customers include Accuweather, Mazda North America, and Lufthansa Systems. Azure has had 198 percent growth since last year, Microsoft said.
