Editing Microsoft Corporation (section)

=== Market Positioning: A Competitive Edge   ===
By the end of 2022, Microsoft’s competitive advantages were evident. Azure’s revenue increased by 33% in the fiscal first quarter, driven significantly by AI services, which contributed 12 percentage points to this growth <ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.statista.com/chart/18819/worldwide-market-share-of-leading-cloud-infrastructure-service-providers/ |quote=Microsoft Azure holds 20% of the cloud infrastructure market share in Q3 2024. }}</ref>. Azure’s market share in the cloud infrastructure sector rose to 20% by Q3 2024, up from 15% in Q4 2018 <ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.statista.com/chart/18819/worldwide-market-share-of-leading-cloud-infrastructure-service-providers/ |quote=Microsoft Azure holds 20% of the cloud infrastructure market share in Q3 2024. }}</ref>.  

Financially, Microsoft demonstrated resilience, with a 12% year-over-year revenue increase in Q2 2025 and gross profit margins exceeding 68% <ref>{{cite web |url=https://bobcutmag.com/2022/05/21/microsoft-competitive-advantages/ |quote=Microsoft's gross profit margins in the last Financial Year exceeded 68%. }}</ref>. The company also returned $10.9 billion to shareholders in Q2 2022, a 9% increase from the previous year <ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/investor/earnings/fy-2022-q2/press-release-webcast |quote=Microsoft returned $10.9 billion to shareholders in the form of share repurchases and dividends in the second quarter of fiscal year 2022, an increase of 9% compared to the second quarter of fiscal year 2021. }}</ref>.  

Looking ahead, Microsoft’s planned $80 billion investment in AI-enabled data centres for fiscal 2025 signalled a strong focus on sustaining its leadership in cloud computing and AI. However, challenges such as fluctuating cloud growth forecasts and rising Scope 3 emissions underscored the complexities of maintaining its trajectory.