Scott Hunter highlights Microsoft’s recognition as a leader in serverless compute by Forrester. The article explores Azure’s serverless innovations, AI-driven solutions, customer use cases, and Microsoft’s approach to empowering developers at scale.

Overview

In this article, Scott Hunter celebrates Microsoft’s distinction as a leader in The Forrester Wave™: Serverless Development Platforms, Q2 2025. The recognition underscores Azure’s commitment to empowering developers and delivering advanced, scalable serverless compute capabilities, particularly via Azure Functions and Azure Container Apps.

Serverless Innovation & Recognition

Microsoft’s vision of serverless is about letting developers focus on code, not infrastructure. The Forrester report marks Azure’s momentum in enabling organizations to rapidly build, deploy, and scale applications regardless of architecture, language, or workload.

Key Highlights

  • Unified Architecture: Azure supports both function-as-a-service and managed serverless containers.
  • Deep AI Integration: Azure serverless compute natively integrates with AI services like Azure OpenAI and supports tools for generative AI, retrieval-augmented generation, and agentic workflows.
  • Developer-centric Tools: Development is streamlined through tools like Visual Studio, VS Code, GitHub Actions, and GitHub Copilot for Azure, offering extensive documentation, templates, and seamless DevOps integration.
  • Enterprise Security: Identity, access management, regulatory compliance, and robust security features guard your applications and data.
  • Flexible Pricing & Hosting: Includes options like Flex Consumption Plan and serverless GPU to optimize costs and performance.
  • Instant Scalability: Scale from zero to global reach with minimal latency, ideal for real-time, AI-powered workloads.
  • Industry Reach: Azure serverless compute powers critical workloads across sectors such as finance, manufacturing, sports, entertainment, and retail.

Real-World Impact

The impact of Azure’s serverless platform is illustrated by a range of customer stories:

  • Hera Space Mission: Using Azure Container Apps and Azure AI Foundry, the project enables interactive deep space conversations and fast satellite image analysis.
  • Coca Cola: Leveraged serverless compute for a global holiday campaign, launching an AI-powered experience in 43 countries.
  • NFL: Integrates Azure Container Apps for real-time, sideline-ready AI insights, turning hours of analysis into seconds.
  • Indiana Pacers: Deploys in-arena real-time captions, improving accessibility with serverless and AI.
  • Coldplay: Delivers immersive, AI-driven visual show experiences powered by Azure Functions.
  • Heineken: Automates secure, scalable AI workflows and powers real-time RAG experiences globally.

These cases highlight Azure’s role in fostering innovation and operational excellence through flexible, AI-integrated serverless technologies.

Continued Innovation

Microsoft is dedicated to ongoing advances in serverless and AI development. Recent updates at Microsoft Build spotlight:

  • Enhanced AI applications and agent capabilities
  • New serverless GPU features
  • Expanding tools, templates, and partner ecosystems

The platform supports a wide variety of workloads—from intelligent agents to real-time data orchestration—by offering reliable, adaptable, and secure compute foundations.

Resources & Community

Developers are encouraged to explore the Azure Tech Community and the latest from Microsoft Build to stay up-to-date with innovations.

Conclusion

Microsoft’s recognition by Forrester validates its leadership and ongoing investment in empowering developers with next-generation, AI-enabled serverless compute. By lowering infrastructure barriers and promoting real-world impact, Azure is enabling organizations to innovate at scale.

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