Information about Walmart and Microsoft's cloud and AI relationship has been leaked.
Business Insider reports that a leaked document showed that Walmart spent around $580 million on Microsoft's Azure cloud services between June 2023 and May 2024.
BI adds that the document details Microsoft's "Azure Consumed Revenue," which measures the dollar value of Azure services consumed by customers, whether they paid a full retail rate or a discounted rate for Walmart.
The company's ACR was nearly $50 million in July 2023, peaking at $61.9m in November 2023, before dipping to $45 million in May 2024.
This kind of data is not typically shared with the public. For comparison, a previous report from The Information said that TikTok spent around $20 million per month on Microsoft's Azure OpenAI service.
In addition to the document showing Walmart's spend, a second leak occurred during the Microsoft Build developer conference last week.
During a presentation at the conference, employees protested Microsoft's business relationship with the Israeli military, which led to an interruption. While this was happening, the company's head of AI security switched screens and showed a Teams message stating that Walmart wanted to "rock and roll" on Microsoft's Entra Web and AI Gateway services.
The two companies have been working together for several years, with Walmart selecting Microsoft as its strategic cloud provider in 2018. At the time of signing that deal, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella told The Wall Street Journal that Walmart's rivalry with Amazon was "absolutely core" to their winning of the contract over Amazon Web Services (AWS).
In 2024, the partnership was expanded with Walmart announcing a generative AI-powered search function built on the Azure OpenAI service.
In addition to working with Microsoft, Baxtel lists that Walmart has two data centers: One in Colorado and a second known as "Area 71" in Jane, Missouri. The Missouri facility spans 125,000 sq ft (11,600 sqm) and has a capacity of over 460 terabytes.
In April 2024, reports emerged that Walmart's global technology platform had suffered 16 major incidents in the first two months of that year.
