Azure Updates: AI Foundry; Grok 4; Cobalt 100

AI continues to dominate Azure announcements. Steve Sweetman, Azure OpenAI Service Product Lead, teamed up with his colleague Naomi Moneypenny to write about AI Foundry multimodal capabilities. Microsoft recently launched OpenAI GPT-image-1-mini, GPT-realtime-mini, and GPT-audio-mini, as well as safety upgrades to GPT-5. The announcements build on the launch of the Microsoft Agent Framework in-preview, multi-agent workflows in Foundry Agent Service in private preview, along with Voice Live API general availability, and the new Responsible AI capabilities. 

Across the new capabilities, Microsoft aims to support flexible image generation, rapid inferencing, real-time responsiveness, affordable scaling, and voice-based chatbots for customer service and support. “The latest GPT-5-chat-latest update in Azure AI Foundry introduces a more robust set of safety guardrails, designed to better protect users during sensitive conversations. With enhanced detection and response capabilities, GPT-5-chat-latest is now equipped to more effectively recognize and manage dialogue that could lead to mental or emotional distress,” the two authors wrote.