At Microsoft Ignite 2025, we explored what it means for organizations to move into the Frontier era of transformation. This shift focuses on embedding AI in all parts of the business to improve decision-making, increase speed and create new value. Organizations leading the way in artificial intelligence are making it a staple. They rethink processes from the ground up and integrate new technologies to increase efficiency.
For partners, this shift towards Frontier represents a significant opportunity to usher customers into this new era. By building AI-powered solutions, connecting data for intelligent insights, and deploying Microsoft Azure cloud platforms, partners can deliver value faster and scale with confidence through the Microsoft ecosystem.
Microsoft Ignite came with a lot of announcements, so I’ve rounded up the Azure updates that are most important to partners. These are capabilities that can enhance your ability to deliver intelligent solutions, drive operational efficiency and differentiate your product or service in the marketplace. You can also explore how partners are turning momentum into action, access highlights and get actionable advice from my Microsoft Ignite session.
Azure Copilot: Now in private preview
Azure Copilot introduces specialized agents to the Azure Portal, PowerShell, and CLI. Using scenarios driven by Azure Resource Manager (ARM) and advanced artificial intelligence models from Microsoft and partners, Azure Copilot streamlines migration, assessment and modernization activities with data-driven insights, guided workflows and improved governance across customer environments. This creates a unified way for partners to deliver intelligent automation for cloud workloads, accelerate modernization projects, reduce operational overhead and strengthen management through integrated agent workflows across Azure and GitHub Copilot.
For more information, see these additional resources:
Foundry Control Plane: Now in public preview
The Microsoft Foundry Control Plane extends Agent 365 by bringing unified visibility, security and control to AI agents operating in the Microsoft cloud. It centralizes policy management, lifecycle management, and observability, offering a consistent way to manage agent behavior and performance. Control Plane enables the reliable deployment and operation of AI-based solutions by providing enterprise-grade management and security capabilities that support secure, scalable and efficient agent management for customers in diverse environments.
For more information, see these additional resources:
Foundry IQ: Now in public preview
Foundry IQ provides a single endpoint for agent knowledge, automating resource routing and retrieval workflows through Azure AI Search. It enables agents to work with enterprise content securely and with greater contextual anchoring by connecting a unified knowledge base to multiple data sources. It represents a simplified way for partners to build Retrieval Augmented Generation (RAG) solutions, connect agents with customer-specific knowledge sources, and deliver consistent, context-rich functionality that enables organizations to get more value from their data.
Read our blog to learn more: Foundry IQ: Unleashing Pervasive Knowledge for Agents
Fabric IQ: Now in public preview
Microsoft Fabric IQ offers a live, unified view of enterprise data and AI agents, organizes information by business concepts, and leverages OneLake to support real-time analytics across hybrid and multi-cloud environments. For partners, Fabric IQ creates the foundation for building intelligent, context-aware solutions that align with business processes, accelerate analytics performance, and empower management to improve reliability and efficiency across customer deployments.
For more information, see these additional resources:
Microsoft Agent Factory: Available now
Microsoft Agent Factory is a new program designed for organizations looking to move from experimentation to faster execution. At the heart of this program is the Microsoft Agent Pre-Purchase Plan (P3), which simplifies procurement and reduces complexity. With P3, partners can offer their customers access to 32 Microsoft services through one flexible pool of funds, eliminating the need to manage multiple contracts or choose between platforms. This single-metered plan not only limits initial licensing and provisioning, but also promotes greater predictability for organizations investing in AI innovation. Eligible organizations can also benefit from hands-on support from industry-leading AI Forward Deployed Engineers (FDEs) and access tailored role-based training to increase AI fluency across teams. Together, they unlock new opportunities for growth and innovation while encouraging customers to confidently embrace the future of AI.
Read our blog to learn more: Accelerate innovation with Microsoft Agent Factory
Microsoft Foundry: Anthropic Claude models are now available
Microsoft Foundry now offers Anthropic Claude models that support advanced reasoning for research, coding, and agent workflows, all under unified Microsoft management and monitoring. For partners, this expands choices across model options to develop multi-step agents using the right model for each task while maintaining management and deployment consistency across Azure, Foundry, and Microsoft 365 Copilot.
Read our blog to learn more: Introducing Anthropic’s Claude Models to Microsoft Foundry: Bringing Frontier Intelligence to Azure
Resale Enabled Offers: Now available through Microsoft Marketplace
Resale-enabled offerings are now available in nearly all regions supported by the marketplace, allowing software companies to work with distribution partners to manage listings and expand reach. This creates new channel-led sales opportunities for partners by making it easier to promote and manage listings on behalf of publishers and reach more customers worldwide without increasing operational complexity.
For more information, see these resources:
Azure HorizonDB for PostgreSQL: Now in private preview
Azure HorizonDB is a new cloud-based PostgreSQL database for mission-critical applications and modern AI workloads that offers automatic storage scaling, fast compute scaling, advanced vector indexing, and integration with Microsoft’s AI and analytics ecosystem. For partners, HorizonDB supports the development of intelligent and resilient applications, the modernization of legacy systems, and the creation of high-performance data platforms designed for security, scale, and future AI workloads.
Check out these additional resources:
Microsoft Agent 365: The control plane for AI agents
Agent 365 extends Microsoft’s user management infrastructure to AI agents, enabling organizations to manage agents across Microsoft 365, Azure and Foundry. Available in the Microsoft 365 admin center with Frontier, it combines Microsoft 365 Defender, Entra, Purview, and Microsoft 365 features for unified security, productivity, and management. This creates a consistent approach for partners to deploy, secure and manage AI agent fleets across customer environments with efficient management and operational clarity.
Read our blog to learn more: Microsoft Agent 365: Control plane for AI agents
I’m looking forward to it
Microsoft Ignite is more than just a product update; it’s time to celebrate what we can achieve together as partners. Continue your journey to explore the Cloud & AI Platform partner sessions at Microsoft Ignite and read the Azure at Microsoft Ignite 2025: Explaining all the intelligent cloud news blog post for more product updates.
Stay connected with us. Follow Microsoft Partner on LinkedIn, join the conversation in our Partner News community, and explore Microsoft’s partner pages to stay up to date.
For details on recent announcements, read the “What’s New in Azure for Partners” bulletin on the Microsoft Community Center and follow the “Azure News” tab to stay up-to-date.