AMD Stock Gains After The Nvidia-Rival Lands Major Microsoft AI Win With Helios Azure Deployment

The expanded partnership also includes new Azure virtual machines powered by AMD's latest EPYC processors and a broader rollout of AMD networking technology across Microsoft's cloud infrastructure.

• AMD also announced that shipments of Helios, including to Microsoft, will begin in the second half of 2026.
• CEO Lisa Su said that Microsoft's deployment marks “an important milestone” as AMD scales its next-generation AI infrastructure.
• Microsoft said the expanded partnership will bring AMD technology to three new Azure offerings spanning AI data processing, chip design and production-scale AI inference.

Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD) on Monday announced an expanded strategic partnership with Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), under which the tech giant will deploy AMD's next-generation Helios rack AI system platform on Azure to power frontier AI model inference.

The expanded partnership also includes new Azure virtual machines powered by AMD's latest EPYC processors and a broader rollout of AMD networking technology across Microsoft's cloud infrastructure.

AMD shares were up more than 5% in Monday’s opening trade, while Microsoft shares were down about 0.5%. AMD was among the top trending tickers on Stocktwits at the time of writing.

AMD Says Helios Shipments To Begin In Second Half Of 2026

AMD also announced that Helios shipments, including to Microsoft, will begin in the second half of 2026.

The platform combines the company’s next-generation Instinct MI455X GPUs, sixth-generation EPYC “Venice” processors, Pensando networking technology and ROCm software in a single AI system designed for large-scale training and inference workloads.

“AMD and Microsoft have spent years building high-performance infrastructure together, and today we’re extending that partnership across the full stack of AMD AI solutions on Azure,” CEO Lisa Su said.

Su added that Microsoft's deployment marks “an important milestone” as AMD scales its next-generation AI infrastructure.

MSFT Expands AMD Footprint Across Azure

Microsoft said the expanded partnership will bring AMD technology to three new Azure offerings spanning AI data processing, chip design and production-scale AI inference.

This also broadens AMD's presence beyond AI accelerators, with the company supplying compute infrastructure for a wider range of cloud workloads.

Microsoft said the new offerings are designed to give customers more flexibility in choosing the right infrastructure for different AI and engineering workloads.

Taking On NVDA

Helios is AMD's answer to Nvidia's rack-scale AI systems, which bundle GPUs, CPUs, networking, and software into integrated platforms for training and inference.

Microsoft's adoption makes it the first publicly announced customer for the new platform, giving AMD a major win as hyperscalers look to diversify and reduce their dependence on a single chip supplier.

Alphabet Inc.’s (GOOG, GOOGL) Google is scaling its custom Tensor Processing Units (TPUs). According to a report by The Information, Meta Platforms Inc. (META) signed a multi-billion-dollar deal in February this year to rent Google’s AI chips.

Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) is expanding the use of its custom AI chips, Trainium and Inferentia, while Microsoft and Meta are continuing to develop their in-house AI accelerators, Maia and MTIA (Meta Training and Inference Accelerator), respectively.

What Retail Traders Think About AMD

Retail sentiment on Stocktwits around AMD trended in ‘bullish’ territory at the time of writing.

AMD stock is up 144% year-to-date, while MSFT stock is down 19%. The S&P 500 ETF (SPY) is up 19% over the past 12 months, while the Invesco QQQ Trust ETF (QQQ) is up 26%.

The iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (IVV) is up 19% during this period.

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