Microsoft for Startups hits a big milestone; adds GitHub, Power Platform access

Two years after Redmond headquartered Microsoft rolled out Microsoft for Startups, the initiative has hit $1 billion in sales opportunities for B2B startups.

The company said that the initiative saw thousands of startups from more than 140 countries connect their solutions to its enterprise customers.  "Startups active in our program are on pace to close more than $1 billion in new sales opportunities over the next year alone,” it said in a blog post.

Microsoft rolled out the ambitious programme in 2018 to become the leading enterprise cloud for B2B startups in the world and committed around $500 million for the programme to get startups to use its cloud services. The technology company pledged it would help startups connect with new customers and channel partners through over 40,000 Microsoft sales representatives. 

Participants were also promised up to $120,000 in free Azure credits, enterprise-grade technical support and development tools – supporting the languages of their choice, such as Node.js, Java and .NET. 

Read: Azure adoption topmost on Microsoft’s mind with new ScaleUp programme for startups

Participating companies will now receive access to GitHub Enterprise, the company said. With this, the startups can access GitHub's features that simplify account administration and provide additional security, compliance and deployment controls as teams scale. Microsoft had acquired GitHub in October 2018 for $7.5 billion.  

Microsoft will also let startups access its Power Platform, which will help them analyse data, build solutions and automate processes.

Last year, the firm had said it has brought all its startup initiatives in India under one umbrella including venture investing arm M12, ScaleUp and partner division One Commercial Partner.