Azure price cuts, IoT and AI transforming cars, Microsoft Azure gaining on AWS & Google, In the Azure cloud world, enterprise architects are the highest paid, Free eBook: Migrating SQL Server Databases to Azure and all the latest news as heard on the latest Need to Know podcast – episode 141.
Some Stats from Ignite Australia 2017
How much data was used? 4.7TB
How many cups of coffee was consumed? 8,800 cups
How many hours of breakout content was logged? 228.75 hours
Script to download all Ignite 2017 AU Sessions http://wellytonian.com/2017/02/microsoft-ignite-australia-2017-sessions-downloader/
Price cuts
Last year Scott Guthrie himself said that Microsoft would no longer compete on price and compete on value instead. However Microsoft have finally dropped prices on some of their virtual machines. Microsoft’s F1-16 series of VM’s are up to 26% cheaper, while the A1 series is about 51% cheaper. This combines with Azure Blob Hot and Cold storage cuts of 38 and 26 percent, respectively
Prices are obviously slightly different for each Azure region, these prices are all based from Azure’s UK South regions
More Info.
How IoT and AI are transforming cars with intelligent mobility
Car makers like Renault-Nissan, Volvo, BMW and Toyota are embracing the Internet of Things (IoT) to provide new ways to help drivers stay safe, connected and productive during their time on the road.
Rather than attempting to build their own connected car, Microsoft are providing automakers with a platform that does the heavy lifting across multiple areas of connectivity.
All new cars these days are like a datacenter on wheels. By 2020, 90 percent of new cars will have connectivity. By 2025, 100 percent of new cars will be connected cars, a 35% increase from today. And by 2030, 15 percent of new cars will be autonomous – and all will send, receive and analyse vast amounts of data.
Microsoft is helping with this digital transformation. With the Microsoft Connected Vehicle Platform. The Microsoft Connected Vehicle Platform is an agile platform for the automotive industry designed to empower manufacturers to create custom, connected driving experiences. It aims to address five key priorities:
telematics and predictive maintenance
productivity and digital life
intelligent and contextual navigation
customer insight and engagement
helping build autonomous driving capabilities.
https://mscorpmedia.azureedge.net/mscorpmedia/2017/01/Microsoft-Connected-Vehicle-Platform-Infographic.pdf
The Microsoft Connected Vehicle Platform takes advantage of a set of core cloud services and productivity technologies using Azure IoT Hub to communicate between the car and the cloud with services like Cortana Intelligence to provide:
advanced navigation
predictive maintenance
remote monitoring of car features
in-car productivity
intelligent, personal assistance for drivers.
More Info. & More Info.
Microsoft Azure is gaining on AWS & Google
Microsoft Azure has more than doubled its revenue in 2016, reaching $2.7 billion, according to an estimate from JP Morgan analysts. Just to give you an overall explanation so you know how everyone is positioned, for the same period, Amazon Web Services reported more than $12 billion in revenue and the Google Cloud Platform’s revenue was more than $1 billion.
Microsoft Cloud reached an annualised commercial cloud run rate of more than $14 billion driven by both Office 365 and Azure.
The revenue from Office was at $23.6 billion for the end of 2016. Server products and tools was $19.2 billion and Windows was $14.7 billion.
Satya Nadella has vowed again that Microsoft will reach $20 billion in annualised cloud revenue by the company’s fiscal 2018, which ends June 30, 2018.
More Info.
In the Azure cloud world, enterprise architects are the highest paid
There are a range of jobs being spun up with Microsoft Azure instances, many with attractive salaries. The Azure-related position for which companies are paying the most is that of enterprise architect.
In the US, companies shell out an average $125,000 a year for Azure architects. Azure Developers and Azure sales and marketing specialists follow at $100,000 a piece.
Architect: $125,000 (in US)
Developer: $100,000 (US)
Sales and marketing: $100,000 (US)
Project services delivery: $90,000 (US)
UI/UX designer: $82,500 (US)
Managed services delivery: $77,500 (US)
Tester/QA: $75,000 (US)
The main barriers to effective cloud delivery include selling the cloud concept to customers (32%) and keeping employees trained and up to date with new technology (31%).
More Info.
Free eBook: Migrating SQL Server Databases to Azure
Part of the “Microsoft Azure Essentials” series, this ebook helps SQL Server database users understand Microsoft’s offering for SQL Server in Azure. Learn how SQL Server in Azure is similar to SQL Server in an on-premises environment and how they are different. The author, a content lead for Azure.com, walks you through the steps of getting started with SQL Server in an Azure virtual machine and with Azure SQL Database. Follow the numerous screenshots to create a trial subscription, create a SQL Server on an Azure virtual machine, create an Azure SQL Database, migrate an on-premises database to each Azure environment, create users, back up and restore data and archive data.
Link to the entire list of FREE Microsoft eBooks
More Info.