Microsoft's cloud continues to grow as it chases Amazon

Microsoft reported encouraging growth Wednesday in what is becoming its most important business: cloud computing. The company, which has focused on the cloud to lead it into the post-PC era, had a lot to celebrate as it looks to catch up to Amazon.com Cloud growth drove the bulk of Microsoft's success in its latest quarter, solidifying its second-place position in the market. The unit containing its Azure cloud computing division made $7.8 billion in the company's latest quarter. While Microsoft doesn't provide dollar figures for each product, it said that revenue from Azure itself jumped 98 percent.