Azure Updates: Vendor assessments; NAT Gateway; Load Testing

Microsoft announced that IDC has recognized it as a Leader in the IDC MarketScape: Worldwide General-purpose Computer Vision AI Software Platform 2022 Vendor Assessment. It received the recognition for its use of Azure Cognitive Services for Vision to support companies like H&R Block with tax form recognition or KPMG to recognize financial risks.

With its responsible AI framework and partner network, Microsoft placed in a similar category as Google and AWS. Microsoft was separately named as a Leader in the Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Integration Platform as a Service by Gartner, for its digital transformation tools like Integration Services, Visual Studio Code, Monitor, DevOps, and App Insights. Companies like DHL and Manulife have used Azure capabilities such as Logic Apps to improve developer productivity for workflows and connect with other Microsoft services.

Product manager Aimee Littleton shared details about Firewall SNAT ports with NAT Gateway to handle large workloads. Source network address translation or “SNAT” port exhaustion is a common problem with large outbound workloads, which occurs when outbound ports are all busy. Azure Firewall inspects outbound traffic and hides IP address details. Problems can arise from manually associating hundreds of public IPs with Firewall or partner networks that limit the number of whitelisted IP addresses. However, by using NAT Gateway, customers can scale up their traffic management, scaling up to 16 public IP addresses or 50 Gbps of outbound traffic.