Michelle Gonzalez’s Post

Another packed and productive week at #MSIgnite!    As the pace of innovation accelerates across AI, cloud, and security, I’m continually inspired by the founders and teams building what comes next. This week, M12, Microsoft's Venture Fund portfolio was out in force, driving conversations, shaping roadmaps, and demonstrating what responsible, enterprise-grade AI looks like in practice.    A few standout moments from our companies on the ground:    Zenity – Included as part of the “AI Operations to own the fleet, master the mission in Microsoft Foundry,” session which reinforced the critical role of observability and unified control to govern and optimize agentic AI. Learn more in this blog post: https://lnkd.in/gaEDT_tQ.    NeuBird.ai – In addition to their session “Agentic AI SRE on Azure for faster RCA and resolution”, I was happy to lead a fireside chat with their customers Venkat Ramakrishnan and Christopher Jones and learn more about how Neubird has been driving their businesses forward.      RegScale – CISO Dale H. delivered a compelling session on turning compliance into competitive advantage. Their approach to continuous, automated compliance is resonating deeply as organizations rethink governance in the era of AI.    Inception – Announced the launch of their model in the Microsoft Foundry model catalog. The addition of Inception's managed compute model advances Foundry's mission of bringing the world's best intelligence into one trusted platform.    Arize AI – Announced their partnership with Microsoft Foundry to empower companies to operationalize trustworthy AI with deeper evaluation, monitoring, and performance insights.    Wandelbots – Shared the mainstage with Microsoft and NVIDIA to discuss advancements in physical AI using simulation and digital twins in robotics development, followed by a deep dive into how Wandelbots NOVA Cloud integrates with NVIDIA Isaac Sim on Azure. Their theatre session with Microsoft on “The new industrial frontier” underscored the transformation happening across industrial automation.    micro1, Reach Security and Typeface were also out in full force, hosting dinners and meetings with executives and analysts.    In other event highlights, our Microsoft Business Development team hosted a great happy hour on Tuesday to forge new connections, and Microsoft for Startups, Microsoft Worldwide Private Capital team, and NVIDIA hosted a mixer convening a great group of VCs, startup founders, and industry experts to exchange ideas.     Ignite always serves as a powerful reminder of what’s possible when founders, customers, and partners come together with a shared purpose. I’m incredibly proud of the work these teams are doing and energized by the momentum we’re carrying into the new year.