Microsoft owns the Azure cloud platform and has ranked among the world’s largest companies by market capitalization.
Azure is Microsoft’s cloud-computing business, offering computing, storage, databases, analytics, networking, and artificial-intelligence services. It competes with Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud, while Microsoft also earns major revenue from Windows, Office, gaming, and enterprise software.
Microsoft was founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in 1975. Its shares were listed publicly in 1986, and the company later became one of the first technology corporations to achieve a market capitalization above US$1 trillion.
Market-cap rankings are not the same as revenue rankings. Microsoft can rank highly because investors value expected future earnings and its broad ecosystem, not because Azure alone is the company’s entire business.