Microsoft Corp's Azure cloud services grew more slowly in its first quarter even as profit and revenue beat estimates, the company said on Wednesday, a sign that competition is picking up in its fastest-growing business.

Revenue from Azure increased 59% in the quarter ended Sept. 30, but came in well below last year's 76% growth.

With Microsoft posting strong results, the company’s CEO Satya Nadella has got a 66 per cent raise in the 2018-19 fiscal, taking his total yearly earnings to a whopping USD 42.9 million, according to media reports on Thursday. While Nadella, 52, has a base salary of a little over USD 2.3 million, most of his pay came from stock awards, reported CNN Business. He received USD 29.6 million in stock award, USD 10,7 million in non-equity incentive plan compensation and around USD 111,000 in other compensation.

Microsoft Corp. employees are circulating a letter supporting an effort to get its GitHub subsidiary to cancel a contract with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, the latest effort among tech-company staff to influence corporate policy on government work. The letter reflects concerns that Microsoft’s sales to the agency implicate the software maker in the government’s detention of immigrants.

Microsoft has become the latest tech giant to foray into phone calls. The company brought the support for voice calls as part of the new features in Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 18999 (20H1) to Windows Insiders in the Fast ring released on Tuesday.

This phone call support has been brought in by Microsoft’s Your Phone app.

Microsoft's October 2019 Event saw the company unveiling a large range of new Surface devices.

Some other big announcements include Surface Laptop 3, Surface Pro 7, Surface Earbuds, Surface Neo, Surface Pro X and Surface Duo.

With an effort to promote the Indian startup ecosystem, Microsoft for Startups has launched a new initiative called ‘Highway to a Hundred Unicorns’ that aims to empower startups with mentoring and technology support for enterprise readiness. As part of this initiative, Microsoft will engage with innovators and entrepreneurs through a series of outreach programmes across tier 2 cities. The American tech major will work closely with state governments to strengthen the startup ecosystems in each state.

Google, in its fifth annual ‘Google For India’ event on Thursday, announced a series of new plans for its Indian market. The company announced that it will setup an AI lab in Bengaluru which will focus on applying AI research to solve problems in healthcare, agriculture & education. Google has become the second international IT firm in India after Microsoft to open an AI lab.

Microsoft Corp said on Wednesday its board had approved a new share repurchase programme of up to $40 billion and raised its quarterly dividend.

The company's shares rose 1.3 per cent to $140.35 in after-market trading.

US technology companies including Facebook Inc, Alphabet's Google, Microsoft Corp and Twitter Inc met with US intelligence agencies on Wednesday to discuss security strategies ahead of the November 2020 election.

The companies' security teams met representatives from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the Department of Homeland Security at Facebook's headquarters in Menlo Park.

Quantum computing, with its power to solve intricate challenges in no time, has been catching the attention of tech researchers and students for some time now. Students today are aware of quantum computing’s ability to run a myriad of conflicting parameters and variables at a pace that is unparalleled. This, however, also begets the need to provide this body of emerging programmers with direct access to quantum programming in course of their education.

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