【#Tech24H】Meta Platforms has emerged as one of Microsoft’s largest artificial intelligence (AI) customers, underscoring that demand for this emerging AI technology is still largely concentrated in the tech sector. According to people familiar with the matter, Meta spends hundreds of millions of dollars each year to access AI models via Microsoft’s Azure cloud services. They add that Meta’s weekly token consumption on Azure has hit the trillions-of-tokens mark. A core pillar of Microsoft’s AI strategy is offering AI models from various providers through its model marketplace called Foundry. As of July this year, Foundry had attracted 100,000 customers. While Microsoft often features clients from traditional industries like manufacturing and transportation in its promotional materials, people familiar with the matter reveal that its largest AI customers today remain predominantly other technology companies, including Adobe, AI firm Perplexity, and Sierra: a customer-service AI startup co-founded by OpenAI Chairman Bret Taylor. [ By Zhang Liyan | Tang Ruohan ]