As discussed in Chapter 1, Introducing the Cloud Native Architecture, the first and foremost aspect in being cloud native is to understand and utilize the cloud provider's services, which can help differentiate beyond the core infrastructure layer.

As per various independent analyst reports and analysis, Azure is the only cloud provider that's close to AWS in terms of its cloud services and ability to execute. So, in lines with that, Azure has multiple offerings that not just cover the core aspects such as compute, storage, networking, and databases, but multiple higher services in the space of data/analytics, AI/cognitive, IoT, web/mobile, and enterprise integration. In the next subsection, we will focus on some of these higher-level applications and managed services that can help anyone be more cloud native and harness the full power of the platform, so let's dive right into it.