Inside Azure innovations with Mark Russinovich | BRK226
Mark Russinovich tours recent Azure infrastructure and architecture innovations, covering high-performance networking, serverless building blocks, and security capabilities aimed at running modern AI workloads across cloud, on-premises, and edge environments.
Overview
This Build 2026 breakout (BRK226) focuses on Azure platform innovations that support intelligent applications at scale, including performance improvements for AI inference and security features for protecting sensitive workloads.
Bare metal instances and OpenAI usage
- Introduces Azure bare metal instances and how they fit into running demanding workloads.
- Connects the discussion to OpenAI/LLM usage scenarios where infrastructure characteristics matter.
RDMA and extending Azure Boost networking to virtual machines
- Discusses RDMA (Remote Direct Memory Access) and why it matters for low-latency, high-throughput communication.
- Covers extending Azure Boost networking capabilities to virtual machines.
Demo: VM-to-VM RDMA over Azure Boost for AI inference
- Demonstrates a setup for VM-to-VM RDMA over Azure Boost.
- Frames the demo around AI inference scenarios where networking performance can be a bottleneck.
Serverless infrastructure and Azure Container Instances
- Transitions into serverless infrastructure concepts.
- Highlights Azure Container Instances as a serverless container execution option.
Hyper-V isolation and direct virtualization
- Explains Hyper-V isolation.
- Discusses direct virtualization and how it relates to isolation and workload execution.
Optimizing inference with KV caches for LLMs
- Introduces KV (key-value) caches as an inference optimization technique for LLMs.
- Focuses on improving inference efficiency/performance.
Confidential computing and protecting data in use
- Introduces confidential computing concepts.
- Emphasizes protecting “data in use” (not just data at rest or in transit).
Future of confidential computing and hardware-protected key lifecycles
- Discusses where confidential computing is heading.
- Covers hardware-protected key lifecycles as part of strengthening security guarantees.
Microsoft Research Cambridge demo: micro-LED cable transmission
- Shows a live demonstration from Microsoft Research Cambridge.
- Highlights micro-LED cable transmission as an example of forward-looking hardware/infra research.