On Wednesday, Japan’s antitrust authority carried out an unexpected raid on the offices of Microsoft Japan, as part of an investigation into whether the company improperly barred Azure cloud platform customers from accessing alternative cloud services. The Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC) is scrutinizing Microsoft for potential unfair trade practices that may contravene Japan’s Antimonopoly Act, and it intends to seek clarification from Microsoft’s U.S.-based parent company. In the fiercely competitive global cloud services market, Microsoft Azure is a key rival to Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Cloud. Microsoft Japan is under suspicion of imposing conditions that either render software unusable or increase costs on non-Azure cloud platforms, while also exploiting the inherent advantages of Windows Server and Microsoft 365 to steer customers toward the Azure platform.