Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the clear leader in the global public IaaS space, capturing more market share than Google, IBM and Microsoft combined. In order to achieve these gains, Amazon entered the cloud market early and invested heavily in the infrastructure to deliver services to global customers. But the market is now seeing similar investments from technology companies, as cloud has become an essential component in the delivery of IT solutions. This means Amazon has to evolve by creating innovative services and delivery methods to its customers.
At the recent 2016 Structure Conference held in San Francisco, Matt Wood, GM product strategy for AWS, highlighted some of the steps the company is taking to ensure AWS will continue to be a major player over the next decade.
With around 1 million active customers per month and $13 billion in revenue, AWS clearly has a lion's share of the market. But as Wood pointed out, it doesn't mean the company is fully comfortable in its position. This is because organizations of all sizes have migrated to the cloud to access a wide range of IT services. The result has been an influx of cloud service providers specializing in different segments in the delivery of these services.
Granted some of these companies are using AWS to deliver their solution, but there are other businesses, such as Google, IBM, Microsoft and many others that are directly competing with Amazon.
The approach AWS is taking, according to Wood, is to make the entire IT environment, in which today's digital companies are operating, accessible in a single platform. He goes on to say the company has made significant investments so users are able to run their infrastructure within the AWS ecosystem for a hybrid path.
According to Wood, the company is fully aware hybrid cloud is the logical step organizations are taking to incorporate cloud technology, and it is making the necessary investments to make this possible for its customers. This however doesn't mean it will in any way yield the formidable lead it has in the public cloud segment.
Wood goes on to say AWS is focusing on providing data center technology to organizations of all sizes, which is placing great value on data. So differentiations will be made on how businesses are using information to introduce innovative products and services to markets faster and with price points its customers can easily afford.
“At AWS, we believe that in the fullness of time the majority of companies will not run their own data centers,” Wood said.
The challenge Amazon faces is it doesn't have an installed base of on premises computing, and there is a large number of companies that have deployed the technologies of Google, IBM, and Microsoft. So taking up the public cloud as its future is the most sensible approach.
Edited by
Alicia Young
