In November, Microsoft hosted the biggest event of the year: Microsoft Ignite. During our live event, we generally covered the most important developments coming our way. On December 3, we organized an in-depth session on Infrastructure as a follow-up to our live event around Microsoft Ignite. During this session our experts Ralph Zeegers, Rob Pijpers and Ramon Camp delved into the latest developments in Infrastructure, such as Azure Local and Windows Server 2025.

Azure Local Functionalities

Rob Pijpers presented the capabilities of Azure Local, a solution that more and more companies are embracing. He discussed:

• The Unified Management Platform for a seamless management experience.
• The availability of APIs for automation, making processes simpler and more efficient.
• The option to run workloads locally with high availability, a godsend for companies with specific compliance requirements.

Disconnected Operations: a solution for OT environments

Rob went on to discuss Disconnected Operations, a feature of Azure Local that is of particular interest to OT environments without constant connectivity to the cloud. Although this feature is still in private preview, it potentially offers great benefits for industrial customers who rely on local operational continuity.

Migration to Azure Local

In addition, Rob covered the migration of existing VM platforms to Azure Local. He explained how customers can move from VMware to Azure Local, in part because of lower licensing costs and improved integration capabilities.

Windows Server 2025: what's new?

Ramon Camp shared the latest features of Windows Server 2025, including:

• Upgrade via Windows Update, which makes updates easier and less disruptive.
• The introduction of hot patching for ARC-enabled on-premises servers, a long-awaited feature for organizations looking to minimize downtime.

Hot patching in practice

Ramon closed with a demonstration of hot patching in Azure. He shared his experiences deploying a Windows Server 2025 machine and highlighted the benefits: less downtime and a faster patching process.