Azure Document Intelligence: Automating Document Understanding at Scale
Azure Document Intelligence (formerly Form Recognizer) is a cloud-based AI service from Microsoft that enables organizations to extract structured information from unstructured documents such as PDFs, scans, and images. It combines optical character recognition (OCR) with machine learning to turn forms, invoices, contracts, and other document types into usable digital data.
We are currently using Azure Document Intelligence for automating document workflows, particularly in areas such as finance, legal, and customer relation.
What is Azure Document Intelligence?
Azure Document Intelligence is part of Microsoft’s Cognitive Services suite and focuses on document layout analysis, key-value pair extraction, and custom model training for domain-specific documents. It provides prebuilt models for common formats (e.g., invoices, receipts, ID cards) and supports custom training using labeled samples.
Accessible via REST API, SDKs, and Azure Logic Apps, it allows both developers and non-developers to integrate intelligent document processing into their applications.
Conclusion
Azure Document Intelligence is a mature and flexible platform for automating document-centric processes. With support for both prebuilt and custom models, it provides a practical path to reducing manual data entry, speeding up workflows, and improving data accuracy. For organizations already in the Azure ecosystem, it offers a natural extension of AI capabilities into document processing.