This Reuters article is about how Microsoft's been quietly leaving China. Back in 2010, Google had left over censorship problems, and Bill Gates and then-CEO Steve Ballmer thought Google was overreacting. However, now, Microsoft has shut down at least 15 offices and joint ventures in China over the last five years.
In 2023, some officials even considered leaving the country, feeling the political risk wasn't worth it, which makes sense as China's only 1.5% of Microsoft's global revenue. Still, they're staying around for a few reasons. Microsoft lets Chinese companies access Western AI models like OpenAI's through Azure, something they can't get any other way. Also, helping Chinese firms expand on a global stage became Microsoft's biggest business in China by the mid-2020s, even if it's still tiny overall.
The irony is that Chinese AI models like Kimi are getting almost as good as the Western models for way less money, so if that keeps up, Chinese companies might just stop needing Azure at all. There's a training angle too; Microsoft Research Asia has been training Chinese engineers since the 90s, and some of them now run parts of companies like SenseTime and DeepSeek.
Basically, Microsoft isn't fully leaving or fully staying; it's just trying to gauge what is happening and trying to predict what will happen in the near future.
Interest: 4/5, The part about Chinese AI catching up and possibly making Azure pointless is the most interesting, according to me, and how it will affect Microsoft.