
Dell's data center solutions division will be tasked with building the Azure servers. The company said that it plans to fashion the Azure systems from a highly-customized version of its rack-mounted data center services.
The company claimed the deal as a clear victory for its cloud server operation.
"Today’s announcement is another example of Dell’s innovative approach of working with customers to design and build an infrastructure fully optimized for their hyper-scale computing environments," said Forrest Norrod, general manager of Dell's data center solutions division.
Azure will be Microsoft's first official foray into the cloud computing field. The web platform will serve as a common link between all of Microsoft's existing web services and give developers a common platform for creating applications based on such tools as .net, SharePoint and Dynamics CRM.
Upon unveiling Azure in Los Angeles on Monday, Microsoft chief software architect Ray Ozzie said that Azure would be "setting the stage for the next fifty years of computing."