Published via L: 2013-05-25 15:41:20
Here’s why: As Amazon Web Services keeps churning out services, support offerings and certifications to appeal to corporate and government users (the latest being FedRAMP accreditation), other cloud vendors need to show that they offer value above and beyond AWS.
Can Anyone Catch Amazon in the Cloud
But, if we’ve learned anything from the past 6 years of its existence, AWS won’t stand still. It now offers several services of its own and through an alliance with Eucalyptus that break down some barriers between a customer data center and its cloud.
WS has a huge head start and lots of customers. But we’re early in the cloud era. IDC says less than 5 percent of the world’s total IT budget is now devoted to public or private cloud. That leaves a lot of upside for Amazon and its competitors.There’s time for Amazon to offer more hybrid options and for rivals to catch up. It’ll nothing if not an interesting market over the next few years.
My Two Cents
The cloud wars have only just begun. While Amazon has lapped the field (yes that means you Rackspace, VMware, Citrix, Joyent, and so many others), this has only just begun. Public cloud as an option for enterprise customers is such a huge step forward. Just think about that only just a few years ago. Any CIO at even a small company would have said, "No Way." I know CEO's of startups who wouldn't stay at even AWS b/c of reliability. Now it's on. Enterprise customers are like fish jumping in a boat trying to learn more and figure out there public, private and hybrid cloud strategy. This is a great time to be a cloud person or business.
Drilling down, when choosing a public cloud option, right now 90% of the enterprises are just calling AWS and trying to get someone to talk to them. AWS has one weakness: they are a machine! Not really, but they are Microsoft re-incarnated. Just joking. It's the Seattle thing with more than just a handful of people moving from MSFT to AWS. But the real weakness is that AWS is for the smart kids and maybe that's enough to drive the enterprise market, but I've met with these CIO's and CTO's and more than a little handholding will be necessary to keep AWS's lead.
Not So Secret Secrets of the Cloud
Cloud is NOT Cheap. Don't migrate to the AWS cloud or anybody else's b/c you think you are going to save boatloads of cash. Not so. AWS is expensive and it adds up quickly. And the pricing is not easy to predict with so many variables involved in the final tally. Please note that this is also true of Rackspace and even the new Google cloud. Pricing for cloud services is tricky and the only real way to learn is to spin up instances with a whole lot of cloud this and cloud that. Then after a while, you (just like everyone else) will figure it out and get a feel for what a cloud bill will look like at the end of the month.
So if it's not price or technology, then guess what? Cloud is now winning the debate or at least controlling the discussion in other areas like security, compliance and maybe even SLA's. Yes, that hard to believe. But it's really because Data Centers get a lot of credit where they really don't deserve it. Security in the cloud: almost, if not just as good as the data center. Security will always be a battleground, a game of cat and mouse. Regulatory compliance, go ahead and audit your data center, you might not like what you find. Cloud stacks up quite well. SLA's are the final battle for enterprise migration to "any" cloud (whether it's Amazon, Rackspace, Joyent, and so on). What happens when something goes wrong - like it did for Rackspace this week. You want to make sure the right person owns the problem and fixes it. And how fast they fix it. In this world, the enterprise will be smart to "drill down" hard as they take up cloud services and the related SLA obligations. SLA's for cloud services and cloud service providers will be a source of contention for a while.
