Microsoft Corp. said its cloud-computing business will continue to grow slowly in the current quarter as the company struggles to build enough data centers to handle demand for its artificial intelligence products.

Revenue in Microsoft's 'Intelligent Cloud' segment was $25.5 billion for the quarter, an increase of 19 percent year-over-year (YoY). Within that, server products and cloud services revenue increased by 21 percent (Azure) and other cloud services grew 31 percent.

Microsoft reported slower-than-expected growth in its crucial Azure cloud business on Wednesday despite beating estimates for overall quarterly revenue, sending its shares down 4% in extended trading.