"Microsoft Accelerates AI Monetization... Surge in Paid Accounts" [Click e-Stock]

AI Cloud "Azure" Growth Accelerates Again
"Copilot" Paid Accounts Surpass 30 Million

There is an analysis suggesting that Microsoft (MS) is boosting its performance by expanding its AI (artificial intelligence) business beyond infrastructure supply to enterprise applications.

According to LS Securities on August 20, researcher Sun Yujin stated, “MS is not only a direct beneficiary of the expansion of AI infrastructure investment, but also a leading company that can convert AI into software revenue by applying it to actual corporate work.”

Researcher Sun emphasized, “MS has an existing corporate customer base, data access rights, robust security and authentication systems, a developer ecosystem, and enterprise work software. This puts the company in a position to remain a key business player in the enterprise AI platform market, regardless of the success or failure of any particular AI model.”

Reuters Yonhap News

The growth rate of Azure, the company’s core growth engine and cloud platform, is accelerating again. In the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2026, Azure’s revenue rose 43% year-on-year, surpassing $100 billion in annual revenue for the first time. Revenue expansion was driven by improved operational efficiency of CPUs (central processing units) and GPUs (graphics processing units), as well as the early supply of new data center capacity. Strong customer demand continues, to the extent that newly supplied capacity is immediately consumed.

Monetization through integration with enterprise software programs is also accelerating. The number of paid “MS 365 Copilot” accounts surged over 50% in just one quarter, increasing from 20 million in the previous quarter to over 30 million in the latest quarter. Researcher Sun noted, “As sales of premium products grow, average revenue per user continues to rise,” and added, “AI is currently serving as a key means to increase the price of existing subscription products.”

High revenue visibility based on long-term contracts is another strength. The commercial segment’s order backlog reached $678 billion, up 84% from the previous year. Even excluding the OpenAI contract, it represents a 25% year-on-year increase. Researcher Sun explained, “As usage-based revenue is combined with traditional subscription-based revenue, a stable earnings structure is being formed despite economic fluctuations.”

He added, “In the short term, high capital expenditures and declining cloud margins could act as stock price discount factors. However, as Azure’s supply capacity expands and Copilot’s account and usage-based monetization are confirmed, confidence in the recoverability of the investment will also increase.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.