Denodo Sells Agora on Azure Without Moving Customer Data

May 27, 2026, Denodo put Agora on Microsoft Marketplace as a consumption-priced Azure SKU. The till is Microsoft’s. The data the product is hired to reach is still allowed to stay out of Fabric.

Agora is the managed cloud form of the Denodo Platform, sold so people and software agents can query live systems across on-premises software, SaaS apps and other clouds. The listing folds that layer into Azure buying, including for firms in Australia, Singapore and the rest of Asia-Pacific.

Agora Is Now a Line Item in the Azure Portal

Denodo, which calls itself a Microsoft AI Cloud Partner, used its May 27 announcement of the Azure listing to say customers can start with a free trial, an annual private offer or usage billing. Suresh Chandrasekaran, executive vice president at Denodo, said the store listing plus the Microsoft AI and data hooks give joint customers a way to run agent use cases against a full hybrid and multi-cloud estate.

The public card is named Agora on Azure (Consumption Based Pricing). It is a checkout change more than a new engine. Agora has been a managed service since 2024, and Denodo already transacted it on AWS. Putting the same layer in the Azure portal is how a data virtualization bill becomes something a cloud buyer can approve next to Fabric capacity.

Denodo’s own account posted the listing the same day. There was no public fight under that post, which fits a channel move: the product did not change, the invoice path did.

https://x.com/denodo/status/2059620699308794342

The Data Microsoft’s Agents Cannot See

Denodo says Agora can reach 200+ source systems, among them SAP, Oracle, Salesforce and Snowflake. The Microsoft-facing pitch is that Copilot, Foundry agents and Power BI users can work from one semantic layer even when the records never land in OneLake.

The consumption-based Agora on Azure offer describes live, zero-copy access, a context-rich semantic layer, and MCP, text-to-SQL and metadata embeddings instead of bulk movement. In plain terms, the agent asks Denodo, Denodo queries the system that already holds the row, and Fabric does not have to become the system of record first.

Denodo also lists native hooks into Microsoft’s own stack, so the layer is sold as a partner to those products rather than a replacement for them.

MICROSOFT HOOKS DENODO LISTS WITH AGORA

• Analytics: Microsoft Fabric, Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2, Power BI and Azure Synapse Analytics.
• AI runtimes: Azure OpenAI, Azure Databricks, Microsoft Copilot agents over Model Context Protocol, and custom agents in Microsoft Foundry via APIs.
• Identity and policy: Microsoft Entra ID, attribute-based access control, end-to-end lineage and policy enforcement on sources outside Microsoft.
• Shared definitions: a data marketplace so business users, including Power BI users, and software agents query the same business terms.

That last point is the operational bet. If a finance definition lives in Denodo, a person in Power BI and a Copilot agent are supposed to mean the same thing when they ask for revenue.

Where Agora Puts Compute and Where Data Stays

Agora splits into two planes. The Control Plane runs in a Denodo cloud account at the cloud provider, and the Execution Plane, which processes data, runs in the customer’s own subscription, so data remains in the customer environment and under customer control. On Azure, that means Denodo plants Virtual DataPort, Scheduler and Data Catalog servers, plus networks, load balancers and related kit, inside the buyer’s account.

The customer still has to open a path to the sources. Internet-facing systems can be reached from the Execution Plane by default. Private Azure sources need peering or equivalent network access. On-premises systems and other private clouds need a VPN between the Denodo virtual network and the source network. The managed service does not magically make a locked SAP box public.

WHO OWNS EACH PLANE

Denodo encrypts data at rest with TDE and in transit with TLS and HTTPS on Agora, and it redacts customer data in Agora logs. Data sources stay under the customer. For HIPAA or PCI-DSS work, Denodo tells customers to set policies so production data is not transferred through the Control Plane. The sovereignty story is this split, not a promise that Denodo will move a regulated warehouse into an Azure region for you.

The MACC Fine Print on Hybrid Licenses

Denodo says the Azure listing qualifies for Azure IP co-sell, and that customers can apply Denodo spend toward a Microsoft Azure Consumption Commitment. That is the commercial hook for firms sitting on unused commit. Buy the data layer through the portal, and the invoice can burn down money already promised to Microsoft.

Microsoft’s own marketplace FAQ is narrower than a slogan. A Marketplace buy counts when the offer is Azure benefit-eligible at the time of purchase, the buy is completed through the Azure portal, and it happens during an active MACC term. Meet those tests and Microsoft applies 100 percent of the pretax amount when it issues the invoice.

THE THREE MACC TESTS

• Benefit badge: the offer must be Azure benefit-eligible when you buy, and earlier invoices do not get a retroactive credit.
• Azure portal: the transaction has to go through Marketplace inside the portal, not a side contract that never hits that path.
• Active term: the buy must fall inside the MACC window; for SaaS, the vendor must activate the subscription before the term ends.

Then the hosting line. Microsoft says the MACC benefit applies to licenses that are MACC eligible and primarily hosted in Azure. A license deployed in a hybrid environment or on-premises is not eligible to contribute. Agora’s value is hybrid query. Its Execution Plane, if you take the Azure SKU, is a set of servers in an Azure subscription that can VPN to on-prem SAP. Whether a given deal is “primarily hosted in Azure” is a contract fact, not a slide. Firms that want the commit treatment should get that in writing, because the same hybrid story that sells the product is the story Microsoft’s FAQ carves out.

Azure prepayment, the old monetary commitment pot, also cannot be used against partner benefit-eligible Marketplace buys. Commit and prepay are not interchangeable here.

SAP, Salesforce, and the Copilot Blind Spot

Denodo’s Azure write-up is blunt about the division of labor. Fabric, through Fabric IQ, supplies semantic understanding and orchestration for agents on Microsoft-held data. Agora is the logical access layer for live operational and analytical data outside Microsoft, including SAP, Oracle, Salesforce, Snowflake and hundreds of other systems. Copilot agents are supposed to come in through Agora’s Model Context Protocol integration. Custom agents built in Microsoft Foundry are supposed to call Agora APIs for real-time retrieval.

Microsoft is pleased to welcome Agora to Microsoft Azure and the Microsoft Marketplace. Together with Denodo, we look forward to helping enterprises accelerate agentic AI initiatives, especially those operating in complex hybrid, multi-cloud and data-sovereign environments.

Jake Zborowski, General Manager, Microsoft Azure Platform, Microsoft Corp.

Zborowski’s welcome names the gap. The hard agent demos fail when the answer sits in a system Microsoft does not run. Listing Agora is how that gap becomes a SKU a field seller can put on a bill of materials.

Microsoft has since given Fabric-resident data its own MCP door. On September 2, 2026, Fabric data agents became generally available inside Copilot Studio as a Fabric IQ Data MCP tool, so a Copilot Studio agent can call governed Fabric data the same way it calls other tools. That makes the Denodo listing clearer, not weaker. Fabric MCP covers what already lives in Fabric. Agora MCP is the path to the estate that never will.

Why Singapore Buyers Hear a MACC Promise

Denodo’s Asia-Pacific telling of the listing singles out Singapore: eligible customers there can count Denodo buys toward a Microsoft Azure Consumption Commitment, while Australia and other regional Azure customers get the same store channel. Richard Jones, vice president and general manager for APAC and Japan, said the listing is how mutual customers point Microsoft’s AI stack at an entire hybrid and multi-cloud data estate, with more agility, scale, cost control and ease of use.

The regional emphasis is not a different binary. APAC firms often keep systems in-country under local handling rules, and they also sign Azure commit. A store SKU that queries in place, plus a path to charge that SKU against commit, is aimed at that pair of constraints. Agora’s Entra ID integration, attribute-based access control, lineage and policy enforcement on non-Microsoft sources are the controls Denodo puts next to that pitch.

None of those controls move the source system. They decide who may see it through Denodo. For a bank that cannot copy a core table into OneLake, that is the product. For Microsoft, it is also a way to keep the AI project on Azure even when the table never arrives.

$63 Credits and the AWS Price Card

Agora bills in Denodo Credit Units. A DCU is a unit of processing capability per hour, billed on per-minute usage. Denodo’s published list price as of January 31, 2025 is $63.00 for one DCU. Credits are consumed by Execution Plane components such as the VDP server and the Data Catalog server, which run in the customer’s cloud account, so the DCU invoice is not the only bill. Azure still charges for the virtual machines, disks, networks and load balancers Agora provisions.

LIST DCU BURN PER 4-CORE HOUR

Prepaid credits and volume discounts sit behind sales quotes. The Azure store adds free trials, annual private offers and consumption plans on top of that meter.

AWS already sold a packaged sibling. The Agora on AWS card lists a Team Tier 12-month contract at $180,000, with single-server support up to 8 cores, 100 data products and 7.5TB/year. Denodo launched Agora on October 21, 2024 and said marketplaces would arrive in order: AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud and Alibaba. The product page now describes Agora as available on AWS and Azure. The Microsoft listing is the one that can sit against an Azure consumption commitment, if the deal clears Microsoft’s tests.

The servers Agora plants in an Azure subscription can query SAP over a VPN. The invoice can still land in the same portal as a Fabric capacity.

Frequently Asked Questions

When did Denodo first launch Agora, and which clouds did it name?

Denodo unveiled Agora on October 21, 2024 as a fully managed deployment of the Denodo Platform. Alberto Pan, executive vice president and chief technical officer, said customers could pick their preferred deployment method while Denodo managed critical platform components. At launch the company said it planned to offer Agora on AWS, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud and Alibaba, in that order of availability.

Does Agora keep disaster recovery on Denodo’s side?

Only for the Control Plane. Denodo’s shared-responsibility model says it does not provide backup or disaster recovery for the Execution Plane or for customer data sources and consumers, and it tells regulated customers to keep production data from being transferred through the Control Plane. The customer owns Execution Plane availability, high availability, autoscaling and semantic-layer backups, including version-control integration.

What else does Microsoft require besides the three MACC tests?

Purchases made before an offer becomes Azure benefit-eligible do not count retroactively, though later eligible charges can. Marketplace spend before a MACC’s effective date does not contribute. In the last month of a term, only the amount transacted that month and invoiced the next month counts, and future installments do not. If a benefit-eligible buy is refunded, Microsoft replenishes the MACC by the refunded amount.

What security audits does Denodo list for Agora?

Denodo says it maintains SOC 2 Type II and SOC 3 Type II on Agora and runs independent third-party audits. On the customer side, the same document asks firms to audit user access at least every 6 months, rotate passwords, and review roles, policies, privileges and data ownership at onboarding and offboarding.