• Microsoft’s president of cloud operations and innovation, Noelle Walsh, posted on LinkedIn that the company would be “slowing or pausing” some of its datacentre investments.
• Walsh did confirm that current projects will continue to receive investment, citing South Africa in particular.
• Microsoft is said to be refining its strategy, given the increased interest in its AI offerings.

The Microsoft datacentre strategy is changing. This, according to a post on LinkedIn from the company’s president of cloud operations and innovation, Noelle Walsh.

The executive announced the change in strategy earlier this week, as Microsoft celebrated its 50th anniversary, sharing some details on its datacentre-related investments to date in the process.

“In the last three years, we’ve doubled datacenter capacity, adding more in 2024 than any other year in history. We expect to have another record year in 2025, and our global footprint continues to expand, across 60+ regions and 350+ datacenters worldwide,” Walsh pointed out.

“This year, Microsoft is on track to spend more than $80B to continue building out our datacenter infrastructure and these investments are informed by near-term and long-term demand signals. Customer demand for our cloud and AI services continues to increase as reflected by strong growth in revenue and customer commitments in Microsoft Cloud and AI,” she added.

While it is clear to see that Microsoft has gone all-in when it comes to its datacentre projects, the pace at which it did so previously is now being accessed, and in particular being refined in some instances.

“In recent years, demand for our cloud and AI services grew more than we could have ever anticipated and to meet this opportunity, we began executing the largest and most ambitious infrastructure scaling project in our history. By nature, any significant new endeavor at this size and scale requires agility and refinement as we learn and grow with our customers,” she shared.

“What this means is that we are slowing or pausing some early-stage projects. While we may strategically pace our plans, we will continue to grow strongly and allocate investments that stay aligned with business priorities and customer demand,” confirmed Walsh.

For those operating in South Africa, the change is strategy is thankfully not expected to yield any difference. Here, Walsh noted that, “In regions where we have existing datacenters and projects, we are continuing our community investments, including programs for skilling and education and help for local businesses to take advantage of the cutting-edge technology our cloud platform enables.”

“We are continuing to invest globally across 18 countries where we have made infrastructure investment announcements starting with Australia in Oct 2023 to most recently in South Africa Mar 2025 this year,” she highlighted.

While it remains to be seen what this adjustment in strategy results in, it is clear that Microsoft is pulling back slightly, while other big tech firms with hyperscaler divisions are doubling down on investments, specifically on the African continent and in SA in particular.

Hopefully, nothing changes in that regard for Microsoft, as recent reports of layoffs within its management tier will do little to quell murmurs.

[Image – Noelle Walsh on Linkedin]