Four notes:
1. Amazon Web Services is one of the largest cloud providers on the market. However, as Amazon continues to expand its presence in the healthcare, financial services and retail industries, it has begun to introduce products similar to what its cloud clients market — leading to some discomfort. For example, since Amazon closed its acquisition of Whole Foods, some grocery retailers have moved to different cloud providers.
2. Executives from Google and Microsoft highlighted this dynamic at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference in San Francisco. In addition to businesses not wanting to add to a competitor’s revenue, they also highlighted issues surrounding data. That is, that companies might not want to share their data with a competitor in their field.
3. In response to an audience question, Julia White, corporate vice president of marketing for Microsoft Azure, said at the event: “We’re not going to turn around and compete with our customers. And that’s obviously a big, big theme that we hear about of the market … The partner meetings I had this morning were like, ‘Hey, I used to work with AWS, but now I don’t. I worry they’re competing with me.”
4. Thomas Kurian, CEO of Alphabet’s Google Cloud business, said at the event: “Google is very clear that we’re here to enable partners, we’re not here to compete with partners.” In a presentation, he highlighted the company’s work with several retail customers, including Best Buy, Home Depot and Target.
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