Welcome to your curated newsletter on what’s shaping the cloud right now. In a few scrolls, you’ll find the admin moves, migration wins, and app patterns that matter most as we head into 2026. Skim, save, and act; this edition is built for you to move faster in the new year, so you can act with clarity and confidence.
Starting Jan 7, 2026, Anthropic (Claude) will be on by default across many Microsoft 365 Copilot experiences under Microsoft’s Product Terms, DPA, and EDP; EU/EFTA/UK remain opt‑in and government/sovereign clouds are excluded. The post details feature losses if you disable Anthropic and a quick admin plan: set the tenant toggle, apply PPAC controls, run pilot groups, and choose Claude vs. GPT per task.
Adapt your skills and master the tools you’ll need to thrive in an AI-powered world. Gain an understanding of core data concepts, explore Azure cloud data services, and learn to use platforms like Azure Databricks, Microsoft Fabric, and OneLake for unified data analytics. Register now to save your spot for this online training session taking place in January 2026.
Who should attend: Data engineers, Cloud solution architects, Database administrators, IT decision makers and pros, Business analysts
Microsoft rounds up significant storage advances that directly impact cloud migrations: faster Azure Blob performance (including Premium Blob for low‑latency workloads), massive‑scale Azure Managed Lustre for AI data pipelines, and practical migration tooling such as enhanced Azure Data Box, Azure Storage Mover, and ANF Migration Assistant for ONTAP estates, all designed to preserve metadata, reduce downtime, and provide centralized orchestration.
Azure introduced a fully managed Blob‑to‑Blob migration capability that lets you move containers across accounts, subscriptions, and regions, agentless for cloud‑to‑cloud, with parallel transfers, portal automation, and real‑time job tracking. This simplifies in‑cloud consolidation and landing‑zone realignment, replacing brittle DIY scripts with observable, policy‑compliant jobs that scale to enterprise datasets. If you’re re‑platforming storage as part of modernization, this feature is a quick win.
A concise, field‑tested guide to application‑centric migration: discover and assess with Azure Migrate, choose the right strategy (rehost/refactor/rearchitect), and design secure landing zones with Managed Identities, Key Vault, and Defender for Cloud, plus DevOps, observability, and AI‑assisted modernization via GitHub Copilot and Azure Advisor. It’s a practical framework to move from server‑first to app‑first wave planning with dependency mapping and ROI/TCO views that keep teams aligned.
SQL Server 2025 is generally available and delivers an AI‑ready, hybrid database that unifies OLTP and analytics for real‑time insights. Native vectors (DiskANN) and T‑SQL model orchestration enable semantic search/RAG in‑engine, while Change Event Streaming and Fabric mirroring streamline data movement; optimized locking and Azure Arc + Entra modernize performance, identity, and security, with edition capacity boosts rounding out the release.
Outcome‑driven and governance‑first, this post shows how the Azure SRE Agent closes the build→operate loop by diagnosing multi‑layer issues (networking, DNS, managed identity), opening GitHub issues, and shipping PRs to IaC/app code, so modernized apps stay reliable without portal hot‑fixes and your team focuses on value.
Modernization isn’t just re‑platforming, it’s enabling new experiences, and this guide shows how to host ChatGPT apps (remote MCP servers with rich UI metadata) on Azure Functions to deliver conversational, action‑oriented capabilities at scale without building custom front‑ends. It’s business‑first and developer‑friendly: leverage serverless, secure patterns to expose enterprise tools to users where they already are, accelerate adoption, and iterate fast with CI/CD, observability, and MCP integrations.
A practical guide to demystify Purview entitlements across E3, E5, and add‑ons, focusing on Copilot governance (e.g., DLP for prompts/responses, Audit Premium coverage, and Teams files vs. chat differences), so you can secure SharePoint and deploy Copilot responsibly without overspending. Use E3 for core labels/DLP; add E5 Compliance for auto‑labeling, Endpoint DLP, Teams chat DLP, and 1‑year audit; or pick E5 eDiscovery & Audit if litigation takes priority.
Protecting people and data starts with clarity, and Microsoft’s latest benchmarking does exactly that: cutting through the noise to show how layered email defenses (Defender + SEG/ICES) actually perform in the real world, including post‑delivery remediation via Zero‑hour Auto Purge (ZAP). For leaders rationalizing controls, this is the kind of transparent, data‑driven evidence that helps simplify decisions, reduce inbox risk, and build trust with auditors and stakeholders
If your SOC is modernizing on the new Sentinel Platform, this deep dive shows exactly where audit activity lands and how to operationalize it, spanning who/what/when/where/how details, surfacing into Purview Unified Audit (via CloudAppEvents) and Advanced Hunting, with practical checks to confirm auditing is enabled. The takeaway is simple and actionable: wire up auditing as a first‑class control, standardize evidence collection for investigations and regulatory inquiries, and align dashboards so your teams can prove outcomes, not just effort.
Pick one featured action and make it real this week. Share it with your team and let’s turn ideas into outcomes. Subscribe to our newsletter for regular up-to-date news.
Thank you for building with us in 2025. 💙 Your momentum inspires ours. In 2026, expect sharper multi‑model Copilot controls, more managed migration automation, and deeper end‑to‑end observability and compliance playbooks from our team, so you can modernize faster, safer, and with clarity.
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