Microsoft Introduces Cobalt 200: New 3-nm Arm Processors for Azure
Microsoft has unveiled Cobalt 200 — its in-house–designed processors based on the Arm architecture, created specifically for the Azure cloud platform. The new chips deliver over 50% higher performance compared to the first generation and will begin wide deployment in data centers in 2026.
During the development of Cobalt 200, Microsoft used simulation techniques and AI to achieve an optimal configuration.
Key features of Cobalt 200 include TSMC’s 3-nm manufacturing process, 132 cores (Armv9.2 Neoverse V3), and per-core dynamic frequency adjustment (DVFS), which ensures optimal energy efficiency.
The chips come with built-in security capabilities, including default memory encryption and support for the Arm CCA architecture for hardware-level isolation. Additionally, they are equipped with Microsoft’s custom hardware acceleration blocks for data compression and encryption.
The first-generation chips, Cobalt 100, already demonstrated a 45% performance boost for Microsoft Teams. Cobalt 200 is designed to significantly surpass this result.
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