Microsoft Ignite 2024 took over the Windy City this week, bringing with it new technological innovation and exciting product announcements aplenty! If you missed the first day of the show, don’t worry – we’ve got you covered with all the latest and greatest Azure Cosmos DB news.

This year’s event saw great enthusiasm and attendance at McCormick Place, in Chicago, with attendees flocking to keynotes, breakout sessions, hands-on labs, and demos offering a glimpse into the future of data and AI. Check out the Azure Cosmos DB highlights from day one below.

Noteworthy Sessions

Microsoft Ignite Keynote

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Executive Vice President, Cloud + AI Scott Guthrie, and other senior leaders kicked off Ignite with an inspiring keynote on the latest Microsoft innovations for AI transformation. Satya highlighted Azure Cosmos DB announcements such as vector search powered by DiskANN (see more below), and leading customers innovating with Azure Cosmos DB, such as Air India and Toyota.

BRK188: Fuel AI Innovation with Azure Databases

Satya’s keynote was followed by a deep dive into how Azure databases are powering new AI applications. Led by CVP of Azure Data Arun Ulag and CVP of Azure Databases Shireesh Thota, the discussion explored how customers are using Azure databases to drive productivity, deliver personalized user experiences, and transform the way people interact with their data. Shireesh highlighted several Azure Cosmos DB updates for Gen-AI applications needing advanced search capabilities:

• Built-in vector index powered by DiskANN, now generally available: DiskANN, a set of advanced vector indexing algorithms developed by Microsoft Research, enables apps to perform a vector similarity search with high performance and accuracy at massive scale. Learn more.
• Full-text search and hybrid search, both in public preview: Azure Cosmos DB now enables developers to search vast amounts of data using full-text search and hybrid search, combining full-text and DiskANN-backed vector search to deliver highly accurate and contextually-relevant results. Additionally, BM25 ranking can be used to enhance text search relevance, by considering term frequency, document length, and term importance. Learn more.
• Dynamic scaling, now generally available: Indexing and search are made even better – and cost-effective – with Azure Cosmos DB dynamic scaling. This enables Azure Cosmos DB to scale workloads based on the most active region and partition, making it great for non-uniform workloads. Learn more.

The lineup of Azure Cosmos DB sessions for the rest of the week includes talks on how to build scalable RAG apps, design for multitenancy, and optimize costs and performance with Azure Cosmos DB, with Toyota, Docusign, and EY sharing real-world examples and best practices. Here’s a look at what’s coming.

Breakout sessions

• BRK117: Lessons from Toyota for Building Durable Multi-Agent Copilots Wednesday, Nov. 20, 9:45-10:30 AM CST

Toyota’s Kenji Onishi, powertrain design developer, will share how his team is using Azure OpenAI Service and Azure Cosmos DB to power a comprehensive multi-agent system delivering fast insights for car development. Azure Cosmos DB leader Mark Brown and Azure AI experts will end the session with demos, best practices, and announcements.

• BRK193: Serverless GenAI: Building Scalable RAG Apps with Azure Cosmos DB Wednesday, Nov. 20, 2:30-3:15 PM CST

Azure Cosmos DB product leaders James Codella and Zhe Li will explore strategies for developing scalable serverless RAG applications. EY’s Bhaskar Bhatt, global product lead, will join the stage to discuss how vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB helps EY achieve a high level of precision and consistency in their sector-led insights platform.

• BRK207: Unlock the Power of Open-Source Databases in Azure Thursday, Nov. 21, 8:30-9:15 AM CST

Start your Thursday with this session on the latest investments Microsoft is making in our relational and NoSQL open-source databases. Azure Cosmos DB expert Avijit Gupta will explore Azure Cosmos DB for Mongo DB’s advanced migration and integration capabilities.

• BRK194: Cosmic efficiency: mastering performance and cost in Azure Cosmos DB Thursday, Nov. 21, 11-11:45 AM CST

Product SMEs Estefani Arroyo and Tara Bhatia will present an exciting session jam-packed with tips and tricks for building high-performance, cost-efficient apps with Azure Cosmos DB. Attendees will learn about serverless vs. autoscale options, data modeling, query optimization, and much more.

• BRK124: How Docusign innovates intelligent agreement management with Azure Thursday, Nov. 21, 3:45-4:30 PM CST

Don’t fall into the agreement trap! Hear from Docusign’s Kunal Mukerjee, VP of technology strategy and architecture, how the company is transforming business with its Intelligent Agreement Management platform. Kunal will discuss how Docusign uses Azure Cosmos DB’s scalability and global distribution to serve 1.6 million customers. Product leader Deborah Chen will then take the stage to offer best practices for building multi-tenant SaaS apps like Docusign’s platform.

Demos

• THR622: Lower TCO and modernize your MongoDB workloads with Azure Cosmos DB (in-person only) Thursday, Nov. 21, 4:15-4:45 PM CST

Product managers Patty Chow and Khelan Modi will demo new features for migrating MongoDB workloads. They’ll discuss how customers can benefit from improved elasticity and performance, without breaking the bank.

• THR609: Parloa’s Agent Management Platform powered by Azure AI (in-person only) Wednesday, Nov. 20, 3:30-4 PM CST

Parloa, a leader in AI automation for contact centers, will showcase their new Agent Management Platform built with Azure AI services and Azure Cosmos DB. Co-founder Stefan Ostwald will discuss the advantages of Azure Cosmos DB for providing real-time assistance to customer service reps.

Hands-on lab (in-person only)

LAB425: Serverless GenAI Apps with Semantic Kernel, Azure Cosmos DB & .NET Aspire

Join the Azure Cosmos DB team in this popular lab on how to build serverless AI agent-based RAG apps using .NET Aspire, Semantic Kernel, and Azure Cosmos DB’s vector search with DiskANN. The lab will be repeated three times throughout the week – RSVP to join on Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday.

• Wednesday, Nov. 20, 8:30-9:45 AM CST
• Thursday, Nov. 21, 8:30-9:45 AM CST
• Friday, Nov. 22, 10:45-12 PM CST

Don’t forget the swag!

Our Azure Cosmos DB booth in the Expert Meet Up (EMU) zone was alive and kicking on day one of the event! In case you missed it, visit our booth throughout the week to connect with product experts and score some exclusive goodies.

Want some extra, extra exclusive swag too? Find a PeerSpot rep outside of Azure Cosmos DB sessions or at our EMU booth. Give a short interview on using Azure Cosmos DB and you’ll get a $50 gift card plus a bonus gift! (You can also schedule a time to chat with PeerSpot later, here).

What else did we announce this week?

• Public Preview: Network Security Perimeter with Azure Cosmos DB: The network security perimeter feature allows Azure PaaS resources to communicate within an explicit trusted boundary. Learn more.
• Public Preview: Autoscale in vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB: Manage workload spikes with instantaneous scalability, ensuring resources are available when needed and optimizing costs. Learn more.
• Public Preview: DiskANN vector indexing and search in vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB: Perform large-scale vector searches while reducing memory usage by up to 10 times compared to other algorithms like IVFFlat and HNSW. This feature helps make recommendation engines, fraud detection systems, and other AI applications more cost-effective and scalable. Learn more.
• Generally Available: Cross-region replication in vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB: Replicate data from a cluster to a read-only cluster in another Azure region. Learn more.
• Generally Available: vCore-Based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB Multishard Clusters: Use up to five physical shards on vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB clusters, enabling larger workloads and higher performance. Learn more.
• General Availability: vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB—up to 32 TiB storage: Host larger workloads on vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB clusters. Learn more.
• Public Preview: Data API in vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB: Work with your MongoDB data through simple HTTP requests, eliminating the need for traditional drivers or complex queries. Learn more.
• Public Preview: Read and read/write privileges for secondary users in vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB: Assign specific roles to users who require access to secondary databases, ensuring that they can perform necessary read operations without compromising the integrity of their primary data. Learn more.
• Public Preview: Change streams on vCore-based Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB: Track real-time updates, inserts, and deletions in your database collections, facilitating the development of responsive, event-driven applications. Learn more.
• Public Preview: New Linux-based Azure Cosmos DB Emulator: Run the new Linux-based Azure Cosmos DB Emulator on Mac ARM64 and x86 architectures, for faster startup times.
• Public Preview: Visual Studio Code extension for Azure Cosmos DB: Connect, query, and manage Azure Cosmos DB resources directly within VS Code, streamlining development workflows. Learn more.

Until next time, keep exploring and innovating!

About Azure Cosmos DB

Azure Cosmos DB is a fully managed and serverless NoSQL and vector database for modern app development, including AI applications. With its SLA-backed speed and availability as well as instant dynamic scalability, it is ideal for real-time NoSQL and MongoDB applications that require high performance and distributed computing over massive volumes of NoSQL and vector data.

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