This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.
Azure
General
Azure Resource Manager MCP Server (preview)
Microsoft has announced the Public Preview of the Azure Resource Manager Model Context Protocol (MCP) Server, a remote MCP server that enables Artificial Intelligence (AI) agents to interact with Azure infrastructure operations through Azure Resource Manager (ARM). This capability gives AI agents first-class access to tools for generating, validating, and executing Azure Resource Graph (ARG) queries, as well as deploying and managing ARM template deployments. With this preview, users can ask natural-language questions about their Azure environment and receive real-time answers backed by generated ARG queries, without manually writing Kusto Query Language (KQL). For example, an AI agent can generate a query to identify virtual machines without managed disks across Azure resource types. The server also supports ARM template deployment workflows, allowing agents to start deployments at resource group scope, monitor deployment status, detect issues, and cancel deployments when needed. Microsoft positions this capability as a foundation for building more advanced AI agents that can understand, query, and operate across Azure environments.
Compute
Azure Dl/D/E v7 Virtual Machines
Azure Dl/D/E v7 Virtual Machines are now Generally Available (GA), powered by the latest Intel® Xeon® 6 processors (Granite Rapids). These new general-purpose and memory-optimized VM families are designed for business-critical and performance-sensitive enterprise workloads, offering improved performance, scalability, and configuration flexibility compared with previous-generation v6 VMs. Microsoft reports up to 20% better general compute performance, larger VM sizes and memory capacities, and significant improvements in networking and storage performance. The families provide three memory-to-vCPU configurations: Dlsv7 with 2 GiB per vCPU, Dsv7 with 4 GiB per vCPU, and Esv7 with 8 GiB per vCPU, with optional local NVMe temporary disks available for scenarios that benefit from low-latency local storage. The new VM series is generally available in Central US, with additional regions expected to follow; sizes up to 192 vCPUs are generally available, while 248 and 372 vCPU sizes are expected to become generally available soon.
Networking
Azure Virtual Network Manager rule impact analyzer
Azure Virtual Network Manager rule impact analyzer is now Generally Available (GA), enabling customers to simulate the impact of security admin rules before deploying them into a production network environment. This capability helps network teams understand the potential effects of rule changes in advance, reducing the risk of misconfiguration, unintended connectivity disruption, and operational impact when applying new or updated network security policies.
Application Gateway for Containers managed add-on with AKS Automatic (preview)
Application Gateway for Containers can now be used with AKS Automatic through the Application Gateway for Containers AKS Add-on in Public Preview. This update removes a previous limitation that prevented Application Gateway for Containers from being provisioned into AKS Automatic clusters. Customers using AKS Automatic can now deploy Application Gateway for Containers by enabling the AKS Add-on, allowing ingress and load balancing to be managed and integrated as part of the AKS Automatic experience. This reduces the need to manually provision or manage supporting infrastructure, aligns with the simplified operational model of AKS Automatic, and enables Azure-native, Gateway API-based application delivery for AKS Automatic workloads.
Storage
Support for workloads with large files in Azure NetApp Files
Azure NetApp Files now generally supports file sizes of up to 64 TiB for regular volumes, enabling migration and operation of enterprise workloads that rely on very large files. This enhancement is especially relevant for scenarios such as Azure VMware Solution (AVS) virtual machines with large Virtual Machine Disk (VMDK) files, where customers previously may have needed to split or restructure data before migration. With this update, organizations can run large-file workloads on Azure NetApp Files more easily while preserving the original data layout.
Managed Identity support for Azure Files SMB
Azure Files now generally supports Managed Identities for SMB access, enabling applications and services to authenticate without storing static credentials, account keys, or passwords. This capability aligns with Zero Trust principles by allowing workloads to use Microsoft Entra-issued tokens instead of shared secrets, improving security for applications and virtual machines that need access to Azure Files. The generally available release also includes support for Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) workload identity and enables application identities and end-user identity access to coexist on the same storage account.
Azure Elastic SAN support for AVS Gen2 Private Cloud
Azure Elastic SAN support for Azure VMware Solution (AVS) Gen2 Private Cloud is now Generally Available (GA), providing simpler connectivity and improved performance for AVS datastore scenarios. With Elastic SAN datastores, customers no longer need an ExpressRoute gateway, and a single Private Endpoint is sufficient to configure the optimal number of iSCSI sessions. This architecture also removes throughput limits imposed by ExpressRoute gateway bandwidth, allowing AVS workloads to consume the full provisioned Elastic SAN throughput. The result is a simpler deployment model and higher-performance storage option for throughput-intensive Azure VMware Solution environments.
Single Volume Snapshots on Azure Elastic SAN
Azure Elastic SAN now supports single volume snapshots in Generally Available (GA), enabling incremental, point-in-time backups of individual SAN volumes. These snapshots capture only changes since the previous snapshot and are stored within the Elastic SAN, allowing customers to quickly create new volumes from snapshot data. Snapshot storage consumes provisioned SAN capacity rather than separate snapshot billing, and snapshot redundancy automatically follows the redundancy configuration of the parent Elastic SAN. For longer-term retention beyond the lifecycle of the source volume, snapshots can also be exported to managed disk snapshots.
AVS support for AV64 SKU on Azure Elastic SAN
Azure Elastic SAN datastores now support the AV64 SKU for Azure VMware Solution (AVS), enabling larger-scale and higher-performance storage configurations for AVS deployments. This enhancement expands the set of AVS scenarios that can use Elastic SAN as a datastore option, helping customers address workloads that require higher throughput, larger scale, and more flexible storage performance for VMware environments running on Azure.
Conclusion
Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.
