Azure Update - 17th October 2025

Key Concepts

• Hot Patching: A new capability for applying security patches to Windows Server operating systems in Azure and outside of Azure without requiring a reboot.
• Spot Instances: Utilizes spare Azure capacity at a lower cost, with the understanding that instances can be evicted if the capacity is needed for regular workloads.
• Spot Placement Score: A new feature for Virtual Machine Scale Sets (VMSS) using spot instances, indicating the likelihood of successful deployment based on region and SKU.
• Azure Event Grid: A fully managed event routing service that now supports MQTT clients and authenticates using OAuth 2.0 with OpenID Connect identity providers.
• MQTT (Message Queuing Telemetry Transport): A lightweight publish-subscribe messaging protocol.
• OAuth 2.0: An authorization framework that enables applications to obtain limited access to user accounts on an HTTP service.
• OpenID Connect (OIDC): An identity layer on top of the OAuth 2.0 protocol that allows clients to verify the identity of the end-user based on the authentication performed by an authorization server.
• Azure Functions Flex Consumption: A serverless compute service that now supports Availability Zones and network-restricted Azure Key Vault and App Configuration references.
• Capacity Reservations: Guarantees capacity for VMs and VM Scale Sets in a specific region and SKU, with a new feature allowing sharing across multiple subscriptions.
• Azure Private Link Service Direct: A preview feature that removes the load balancer requirement for exposing services to private endpoints, allowing connection to any routable IP address.
• Azure Firewall Observed Capacity Metric: A new metric providing insights into capacity usage patterns to aid in pre-scaling.
• Azure Firewall Pre-scaling: Allows scaling Azure Firewall in advance of demand spikes based on learned usage patterns.
• Azure Storage Discovery: An enterprise-wide visibility tool for data in Azure Blob Storage and Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2, integrating with Copilot.
• Azure Databricks to SAP Business Data Cloud Connect: Enables bidirectional, zero-copy database sharing for cross-system analysis.
• Azure Database Migration Service PowerShell Module/Azure CLI: New tools for automating database migrations.
• Azure Integrated Hardware Security Module (HSM): A preview feature providing FIPS 140-3 Level 3 key protection within the compute node.
• Custom Vision: A service being retired and replaced by Azure Machine Learning AutoML or generative AI solutions.
• Azure API Management Environmental Sustainability: A preview feature providing carbon footprint information for API infrastructure.
• Azure Site Recovery Ultra Disk Support: General Availability for using Ultra Disks for replication, failover, and failback.
• GPT-4 Turbo with Vision (GPT-4V) Image 1 Mini Model: Now available in global deployments for multimodal (text and image) capabilities.

New Videos

• Hot Patching: This video delves into the new capability to apply security patches to Windows Server operating systems (both in Azure and outside) without requiring a reboot. The update suggests a shift from monthly reboots to quarterly reboots for security patching.

Compute Updates

Spot Placement Score for VM Scale Sets

• Concept: Spot instances leverage spare Azure capacity at a reduced cost, with the understanding that these instances can be evicted if the capacity is needed for pay-as-you-go workloads. This is ideal for fault-tolerant or resumable workloads.
• New Feature: A "spot placement score" is now available for Virtual Machine Scale Sets (VMSS) using spot instances.
• Functionality: This score indicates the likelihood of successfully deploying into spot capacity, categorized as high, medium, or low.
• Benefits: Helps users understand the probability of their spot instance deployments succeeding based on the chosen region and SKUs.

Azure Event Grid Enhancements

• Core Functionality: Event Grid is a fully managed event routing service that notifies subscribers when an event occurs, eliminating the need for subscribers to constantly poll the source.
• MQTT Client Support: Event Grid now supports MQTT clients for authentication using OAuth 2.0 from any OpenID Connect identity provider, including Azure Entra ID.
• Client Connection Validation: Client connections can be validated using a webhook or an Azure Function, allowing for custom validation logic.
• Routing to Fabric Event Streams: MQTT messages and Cloud Events from Event Grid namespaces can now be routed to Fabric Event Streams, which are designed for high-velocity, high-volume real-time analytics.
• Client Identity Assignment: Client identities can be assigned to MQTT clients for improved tracking.

Azure Functions Flex Consumption Updates

• Availability Zones: Flex Consumption apps can now enable Availability Zones for enhanced reliability, applicable to both new and existing deployments.
• Network-Restricted References: References to Azure Key Vault and App Configuration within app settings are now supported, even if those resources are network-restricted. This was a previously unsupported scenario.

Capacity Reservation Group Sharing

• Core Functionality: Capacity Reservations allow users to purchase and guarantee capacity for specific regions and SKUs, ensuring availability for provisioned VMs or VM Scale Sets. Users pay for the reserved capacity from the moment of creation.
• Previous Limitation: Capacity reservations were previously limited to the subscription in which they were created.
• New Feature: Capacity Reservation Groups can now be shared across up to 100 other subscriptions.
• Benefits:
  • Centralized Management: Allows for central management of capacity reservations within a specific subscription.
  • Flexibility: Enables development, testing, and disaster recovery (DR) environments to share a single capacity reservation.
  • DR Scenario Example: In a disaster scenario where the primary region is unavailable, a development environment using a capacity reservation could be shut down, and a production DR environment could be started within that same reservation, guaranteeing capacity availability in the DR region.
• Current Status: This feature is available in preview and requires API usage (not yet in the portal).

SKU Retirements

• Upcoming Retirements (3 Years): The following SKUs are scheduled for retirement in approximately three years: FFS, FSv2, LSv2, GGS, AV2, AMV2, and the B series. Users are advised to migrate to newer SKU versions.
• Confidential Containers on AKS Retirement: Confidential containers on Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), which utilized Kata isolation, will be retired on March 2, 2026. The focus is shifting to specific production-ready solutions.

Networking Updates

Private Link Service Direct (Preview)

• Traditional Private Link Service: Typically requires resources to be behind a Standard Load Balancer, to which the Private Link Service is attached, enabling private endpoint creation.
• Private Link Service Direct: This preview feature removes the load balancer dependency. It allows the Private Link Service to be used with any routable IP address.
• Use Cases:
  • Direct IP-Based Routing: Suitable for custom applications or database connections that require direct IP-based routing.
  • On-Premises Services: Can expose on-premises services as long as the VNet hosting the Private Link Service Direct has a network path (e.g., ExpressRoute private peering).
• Benefits: Offers greater flexibility in exposing services directly to routable IP addresses.

Azure Firewall Enhancements

• Observed Capacity Metric: A new metric is available that shows the number of capacity units leveraged over time.
• Benefits of Observed Capacity: Helps users understand usage patterns, which can inform Azure Firewall pre-scaling strategies.
• Pre-scaling (GA): This feature, now generally available, allows users to scale Azure Firewall in advance of anticipated demand spikes based on learned patterns.
• Benefits of Pre-scaling: Prevents performance degradation during scaling events by proactively adjusting capacity.
• Applicability: Pre-scaling can be used for both Standard and Premium SKUs of Azure Firewall.

Storage Updates

Azure Storage Discovery (GA)

• Functionality: Provides enterprise-wide visibility into data stored in Azure Blob Storage and Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 (Azure Storage with a hierarchical namespace).
• Integration: Integrates with Copilot in Azure for natural language interactions.
• Workspace Limits: A single storage discovery workspace can support up to 1 million accounts across subscriptions and regions within the same tenant.
• Free Offering:
  • Provides insights into capacity trends, distributions, and top usage accounts.
  • Includes 15 days of data retention.
• Standard Offering (Paid):
  • Includes all insights from the free offering.
  • Adds transactional and configuration insights.
  • Offers 18 months of data retention.
• Backfill: Upon enabling Storage Discovery, 15 days of historical data backfill is provided, offering immediate insights.

Database Updates

Azure Databricks to SAP Business Data Cloud Connect

• Functionality: Enables bidirectional, zero-copy database sharing between Azure Databricks and SAP Business Data Cloud.
• Benefits:
  • Provides full context and analysis across systems without duplicating data.
  • Increases visibility into data across integrated platforms.

Azure Database Migration Service PowerShell Module and Azure CLI

• New Tools: A new PowerShell module and Azure CLI commands are available for managing the Azure Database Migration Service.
• Benefits: Facilitates automation of database migrations, including creation, management, and integration with DevOps processes.

Miscellaneous Updates

Azure Integrated Hardware Security Module (HSM) (Preview)

• Functionality: A cryptographic accelerator chip integrated directly within the compute node.
• Security Standard: Provides FIPS 140-3 Level 3 key protection.
• Availability: Available as part of the AMD D and EV7 series compute nodes.
• Benefits:
  • Offers key and security asset protection while in use.
  • Eliminates network round trips for key operations, unlike remote HSMs, by binding directly to the local workload.

Custom Vision Retirement

• Retirement Date: Custom Vision is scheduled for retirement on September 25, 2028 (in 3 years).
• Recommended Alternatives:
  • Azure Machine Learning AutoML: For training custom models with vision capabilities.
  • Generative AI Solutions: Including Azure AI Content Understanding capabilities.
• Guidance: Users are advised to assess their specific needs and choose the most cost-effective solution.

Azure API Management Environmental Sustainability (Preview)

• Functionality: Provides information on the carbon footprint of API infrastructure.
• Potential Use Cases: Enables users to make informed decisions to reduce their environmental impact, such as dynamically shifting API traffic to lower-carbon emission options in real time.

Azure Site Recovery Ultra Disk Support (GA)

• Feature: Ultra Disk support is now generally available for Azure Site Recovery.
• Ultra Disk Characteristics: Ultra Disks offer the lowest latency and highest performance, with independently configurable capacity, IOPS, and throughput, which can be dynamically changed.
• Application: Ultra Disks can be used for replication, failover, and failback of virtual machines.

GPT-4 Turbo with Vision (GPT-4V) Image 1 Mini Model

• Availability: Now available as part of global deployments.
• Benefits: Offers a good balance of performance and cost.
• Capabilities: Remains multimodal, supporting both text and image inputs.

Conclusion

This week's Azure update highlights significant advancements across compute, networking, storage, and database services. Key themes include enhanced reliability and flexibility through features like hot patching and shared capacity reservations, improved security and management with integrated HSMs and new migration tools, and greater efficiency and cost optimization with spot instance scoring and pre-scaling capabilities. The updates also emphasize the ongoing evolution of AI and machine learning services, with retirements of older services prompting migration to more advanced platforms. The introduction of environmental sustainability metrics in API Management signals a growing focus on responsible cloud computing.