Microsoft is announcing a slew of new features and products across a variety of business areas at the Ignite conference for IT pros and developers in Orlando this week.
As the conference kicked off Monday, Microsoft released a “Book of News,” a 27-page compendium of more than 80 product and feature announcements. The new releases span areas like cybersecurity, artificial intelligence and data, Internet of Things, Azure cloud computing and Microsoft 365 productivity tools.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella opened the event by highlighting some of these announcements and imparting advice to the audience about staying relevant amid a world of digital transformation. He was joined by Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen and SAP CEO Bill McDermott to unveil a new alliance between the three tech giants called the Open Data Initiative.
Here are some of the biggest announcements from Microsoft so far:
- Microsoft partners with Adobe and SAP for new Open Data Initiative
- Building virtual replicas of physical spaces with Digital Twins
- Microsoft Teams now used by 329,000 organizations as it takes on Slack
- Co-authoring Office 365 documents with LinkedIn connections
- New hybrid cloud hardware and services
- Surface Hub 2 rollout begins next year with “phased introduction”
- SQL Server 2019 headlines new cloud database features
- Microsoft commits $40 million over five years for AI for Humanitarian Action initiative
- Security products aim to make Azure and Microsoft 365 the safest spaces in the cloud
