April 20, 2024

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[THE INVESTOR] Microsoft Korea said on March 20 that sales of its open cloud computing platform Azure rose nearly threefold in one year.

Microsoft opened two data center regions in Korea for Azure in February 2017, one in Seoul and another in the southern port city of Busan. The company’s data center regions are large complexes that serve a given geographic location considered a core area for cloud computing service.

“Sales from Azure data service grew 277 percent (on-year in 2017),” Koh Alfred, CEO of Microsoft Korea, told reporters in Seoul.

The executive also said sales of its other cloud computing service, Office 365, jumped nearly 40 percent on-year during the cited period.

Earlier, Microsoft added artificial intelligence functions to Office 365, allowing Word, Outlook, PowerPoint and Excel to be backed up by various cloud-powered AI capabilities through data centers in Korea that employ machine learning capabilities.

“Data centers located in Korea are world-class cloud computing facilities that boast safety and functionality,” Koh said.

By Song Seung-hyun and newswires (ssh@heraldcorp.com)